Aston Villa will seek to maintain their recent resurgence in the Premier League when they welcome Chelsea to Villa Park for an entertaining night on Boxing Day with kickoff at 20:30.
The appointment of Steven Gerrard as Aston Villa manager has proved to be the right the decision made by the club’s board, as the Villans have enjoyed a ‘new manager bounce’ posting four league wins from six since the former Liverpool captain took over.
Villa were among the many Premier League clubs to have their last weekend matches postponed due to the outbreaks in most of the clubs. However, prior to all that Aston Villa had managed to move into the top 10 of the Premier League table with a well-deserved 2-0 victory over Norwich City.
Despite losing out to Liverpool and Manchester City, Steven Gerrard’s side would be happy with their performances as they held their own in the two matches that they could have otherwise lost easily. Taking from that Gerrard’s side will fancy their chances of taking it out against a stumbling Chelsea.
Indeed, Thomas Tuchel’s Chelsea are enduring a sticky spell at the moment, with the club winning in just one of their last four Premier League Matches.
The Blues are coming off a 0-0 draw against Wolves at Molineux last weekend and as a result, they have slipped six points behind league leaders Man City and cannot afford any more setbacks as that could have fatal consequences to their Premier League tittle ambitions.
However, Tuchel’s side are coming off a confidence-boosting 2-0 win over Brentford in the quarter finals of the league Cup in midweek and will be planning to bounce back as they aim to remain in touch with the top two.
Aston Villa vs Chelsea head to head
Both sides have met in 56 encounters since 1993 with Chelsea claiming 30 victories while Aston Villa have claimed 13 victories and there have been 13 draws.
- Chelsea 4-3 Aston Villa 22/09/21
- Chelsea 3-0 Aston Villa 11/09/21
- Aston Villa 2-1 Chelsea 23/05/21
- Chelsea 1-1 Aston Villa 28/12/20
- Aston Villa 1-2 Chelsea 21/06/20
Home
- Norwich 0-2 Aston Villa
- Liverpool 1-0 Aston Villa
- Aston Villa 2-1 Leicester
- Aston Villa 1-2 Man City
- Palace 1-2 Aston Villa
Away
- Brentford 0-2 Chelsea
- Wolves 0-0 Chelsea
- Chelsea 1-1 Everton
- Chelsea 3-2 Leeds
- St Petersburg 3-3 Chelsea
Aston Villa team news
Aston Villa will be without Bertrand Traore, Leone Bailey, Emiliano Buendia and Marvelous Nakamba through injuries while Anwar El Ghazi, Jed Steer and Morgan Sanson will be out due to Covid-19.
Chelsea team news
Chelsea will be without Ben Chilwell through an injury while Romelu Lukaku, Timo Werner, Kai Harverts and Callum Hudson-Odoi have all been hit with the coronavirus outbreak.
Prediction and odds
- Draw
- Double chance
- Goals over 2.5
