Round 24: Blackburn at Villa Park
By: irish_steve | January 25th, 2008Villa come into this game on the back on a fortuitous draw against Liverpool which will be a massive boost to the club. An away point against one of the “big 4” is a great achievement. Villa will now be looking to make it an amazing 8 games unbeaten in the league. Villa have beaten Blackburn in their last 3 league encounters and a win tomorrow would put them in a Champions League spot.
Gareth Barry is a doubt again which is a major blow and Villa who need someone to help Reo Coker in the center of the park. Petrov and Gardener didn’t have the best of games on Monday and they will both need to improve their performances if Villa are to get a win. Agbonlahor is another player who wasn’t involved too much in the Liverpool game and he will look to be more active against a defense that will be missing Ryan Nelsen.
This is going to be a very close game with both teams having long unbeaten runs and both looking leapfrog the teams around them who are playing FA Cup ties. It will be very interesting to see if Martin O’Neill plays Olaf Mellberg. If he does play, it could mean he will sign for Juve and join them in the summer but Juve have made an approach to sign him in during this transfer window. If he doesn’t play, he could be leaving Villa by the end of next week which would be a big blow. Martin O’Neill was quoted this week saying that he will play Olaf even if he signs a contract to join Juve over the summer, a thing a lot of managers wouldn’t do.
My prediction: 1-0
(Villa fans in the US can watch this game live on Setanta Sports at 9am Central Time)
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