Leicester City vs Aston Villa starting XI predicted as Unai Emery forced into change

Aston Villa are looking to return to winning ways on Saturday as they face Leicester City at the King Power Stadium.

Unai Emery’s side come into the game on the back of a 2-0 defeat to Arsenal at Villa Park. They were punished for missing chances after Ollie Watkins passed up on two golden opportunities to break the deadlock before Leandro Trossard opened the scoring in the 67th minute.

Thomas Partey then doubled Arsenal’s lead 10 minutes later to condemn Villa to their first defeat of the campaign after they beat West Ham 2-1 at the London Stadium on the opening weekend. Emery has already been forced into one change after Matty Cash came off injured against Arsenal last weekend.

The right-back is expected to be sidelined for a month after injuring his hamstring when trying to block a cross at the start of the match. Had also came off in the closing minutes of Villa’s win at West Ham because of fatigue in his hamstring, but was deemed fit to play against Arsenal.

Kosta Nedeljkovic is expected to make his first start for Villa after he was picked to come on ahead of Diego Carlos against Arsenal. Emery explained after the game that he wanted to keep Ezri Konsa at centre-back instead of shifting him out to right-back.

Nedeljkovic is the only recognised right-back in the Villa squad available to Emery for this weekend’s game. Emi Martinez will start in goal with Pau Torres and Konsa as the centre-backs.

Lucas Digne could keep his place in defence given that one of Leicester’s main threats is right winger Abdul Fatawu. Ian Maatsen has impressed off the bench against West Ham and Arsenal, but Emery may not want to make another change to the back four considering Cash is already out.

Amadou Onana and Youri Tielemans are expected to keep their places in the double pivot, with Leon Bailey playing from the right and John McGinn from the left as Morgan Rogers supports Ollie Watkins in attack.

Predicted Villa XI vs Leicester (4-2-3-1): Martinez, Nedeljkovic, Konsa, Torres, Digne, Onana, Tielemans, Bailey, McGinn, Rogers, Watkins