Match Focus: Baptism of Fire for Garde as Man City Travel to Villa
Aston Villa vs Manchester City
Having parted ways with Tom Sherwood a fortnight ago Aston Villa finally announced the appointment of Remi Garde ahead of their game at Tottenham on Monday, with the Frenchman in the stands to run the rule over his new team. It was the perfect example of the task at hand for the former Lyon boss, with Villa - under the tutelage of Kevin MacDonald - taking well over an hour to realise that they could salvage something from a game in which Tottenham had become complacent following an early onslaught.
A home match against league leaders Manchester City will be a real baptism of fire for the new Villa boss, though with nothing expected of the hosts Garde can at least focus on a positive performance without being all too concerned with the result. That said, having lost 7 successive league matches the new man doesn't have long to arrest the Villans' slump to the foot of the table, and keeping the likes of Sterling, De Bruyne and Toure at bay would be no mean feat.
The return of captain Micah Richards is not only a boost for the home side but will see the defender make his first appearance against his former club, with the likes of Lescott and Sinclair also in contention to prove their worth having been let go by the visitors. It's City's stars, however, that will rightly be expected to run the show.
Yaya Toure was on the scoresheet in this fixture last season, as well as netting the winner from the spot against Norwich last weekend. The Ivorian, in fact, has scored in 3 of his last 4 appearances against Aston Villa and could be set to see a rise in his current market price of £22.00 on Buabook's season markets. Likely to to be deployed in an attacking role once more, though his price is fairly hefty I'll be buying stock in Toure at anything south of £25, looking to sell once the likes of Silva and Aguero return, with a challenging couple of home games against Southampton and Liverpool in the coming weeks.
Elsewhere for the visitors Kevin De Bruyne will hope to keep his place as Manchester City's highest rated player (7.68 league rating) of those to feature more than 5 times thus far. The Belgian has 3 goals and 4 assists to his name already for the club in England's top-flight and, having been rested in midweek, should pick up where he left off. A Buabook season fair price of £17.15 is modest enough and given his consistency, buying shares in the reason of £20 shouldn’t carry too much risk.
Villa will hope that their own attacking players can pose a threat at the other end, particularly through Gestede and Ayew - who has scored in back-to-back league games after a slow start - but City will be strong favourites, and understandably so. With Garde's credentials not being measured in such games the home side just need to show some spirit and signs of improvement against Pellegrini's men to encourage the fans.
You can trade the values of any of the players on display as Aston Villa host Man City with Buabook, the first player trading exchange based on detailed statistics
