Battle of the two Midlands heavyweights commences at Villa Park on Saturday. What felt like yesterday, these historic giants met in the 25/26 Europa League semi-finals, in which Aston Villa went on to win in style. After a disappointing 1-0 away loss in the first leg for the Villans, a Chris Wood penalty to unsettle the nerves and light the spark in the City Ground, John McGinn helped send Villa Park into bedlam with a 4-0 home win in the 2nd leg. The Villans went on to win the tournament in Istanbul, with Forest heartbreakingly missing out on European glory. It's a different chapter for the Villa this time, only 5/11 players remain from the starting XI against Forest and of course that glorious night in Istanbul. Coming back from a thrilling 2-3 win in Bruges, confidence has returned into their spine, after a disappointing draw to Hull last week. Players like Buendía, McGinn and Torres found their feet again, with Nicolas Jackson, Zion Suzuki and Joao Gomes settling in to Unai Emery's system. The latter will still be suspended for this match however, after Gomes suffered a 3 match suspension in an embarrassing away trip to Brighton. Leon Goretzka, Brian Madjo and Kéba Cissé are still out until the international break, with Amadou Onana out with an unfortunate long term ACL injury from his time at the World Cup. Matty Cash suffered from muscle pain on Tuesday, so did not travel, with Wan-Bissaka coming in. He will likely be available for this game, but Unai Emery is known for not taking risks with his players, meaning he could feature on the bench or still not feature in the squad. Two debutants can feature for Villa, Taylor Harwood-Bellis and Ibrahim Mbaye, both exciting prospects for the future of Aston Villa. Nottingham Forest come into this game off the back of a 0-0 home draw to Spurs, in which they felt they could've got a lot more than a point at the City Ground. Forest had a Morgan Gibbs-White chip ruled out by VAR for handball, which was spoken about online on whether it should've stood or not. Forest are winless in 4/4 games this season (D2 L2) but had a great performance at Anfield, something Oliver Glasner will be looking to replicate here, although with all 3 points this time. Speaking of Glasner, there's very good news for the Reds, he seems to be Unai Emery and Aston Villa's kryptonite. Glasner has not won in 10 Premier League games (D5 L5), but is unbeaten in all 7 games against Aston Villa (W5 D2) in which his former team Crystal Palace scored 19 goals and only conceded 4 (this stat gives me trauma). Forest fans will be hoping this stat continues, Glasner always seems to have Emery's number. On the downside, the reds suffer with an injury to Nicolo Savona, with Ibrahim Sangare yet to be assessed on whether he is match fit. James McAtee has been a standout player for Forest so far, proving to the fans why he should be consistently in the Starting XI. In the last 3 Premier League meetings between the two sides, Villa are unbeaten (W2 D1), with Forest only managing 4 wins in the last 25 ties in this fixture in all competitions. Can their luck change with Oliver Glasner at the helm? Or will Unai Emery finally find a way to beat his unlikely nemesis...