So up next we have the famous Toon Army – the team we taunted a few seasons back when they went down on the last game of the season under Alan Shearer, and the same team who gave us a 6-0 thrashing at St James’ Park earlier this season.

In any normal kind of season, predicting a result for this match would be relatively easy – Newcastle didn’t so much as decline under the tenure of Mike Ashley, they positively plummeted. Players were sold, unrest in the dressing room was abundant, a manager was in place who the fans didn’t want… wait that sounds familiar.

Anyway – on to the match. We need to play either a 4-3-3 formation, or a 4-4-2 in order to win this match. If anything has been learned by playing 4-5-1 counter attacking football, it is that you can’t play it at home. It works well when other teams are flying at you to counter attack, but not so much when you have a home crowd and want to pick up three points.

For me, I’d go for 4-4-2 with Heskey and Bent up front, with Makoun and NRC in midfield, along with Downing and Young on the wings. I know this might upset some fans who view Albrighton as a great player, but I think that Ashley Young and Downing have the experience needed to go for three points. Marc, on the other hand, is susceptible to making foolish tackles at important stages of the game.

The defence is pretty much obvious – Luke Young, Dunne, Collins, Walker. Whilst I don’t think that Dunne and Collins will be here next year, I think that it isn’t a time for Clark to be coming in to a red-hot atmosphere and getting red carded, which I personally think could be the case.

Anyway, in order to give a little bit more information on the key statistics of the upcoming match, I would like to cover them below:

Statistics

The following statistics are provided kindly by Eurosport/Yahoo UK.

Aston Villa have dropped more points (23) from winning positions than any other team in the Premier League.

Villa have conceded more headed goals than any other team in the Premier League (13).

If Darren Bent (five goals) scores, he will become Villa’s joint-top scorer this season, despite only joining them in January.

Villa have won only one of their last seven Premier League matches.

Gerard Houllier’s side have kept just one clean sheet in their last 10 Premier League matches at Villa Park.

Six of the last seven meetings between Villa and Newcastle have ended as a home win and none of them as an away victory.

Villa have conceded more goals from corners than any other team in the Premier League (13).

Newcastle have only conceded 11% of their goals from headers, the lowest proportion in the top division.

Aston Villa have conceded more goals to oppositions defenders than any other side (11), but only two of Newcastle’s goals have been scored by defenders, the joint-fewest in the top flight.

Ashley Young has won five penalties, more than any other player in the Premier League this season.

Conclusion

If the above statistics teach us anything, it is that we need to be very wary at the end of the game. Whether this means bringing on fresh legs in defence at the 60 minute mark (Clark/Cuellar come to mind), and/or maybe switching Makoun out for Petrov later in the game, we need to ensure we don’t concede later on. Obviously we need to ensure we’re not conceding earlier, but soft goals are out let down this season. If we can stay solid defensively, and this might mean that Houllier plays four centre halves across the defence as an alternate idea, then I have every belief that Darren Bent will pop up and score.

A final salient point missed out from the above statistic is this one – Darren Bent has yet to have a shot that isn’t on target for Villa this season. If we once sung “Feed the Hare”, then we need to ensure Darren Bent is fed effectively from the wings by Young and Downing. Then, I believe, we will come away from this match with the three points we really need.

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