Arsenal v Aston Villa match preview and score prediction

It must be Sunday because hopes are raised for a good Arsenal performance in the Premier League and today I feel those hopes are justified.

Arsenal bounced back from a terrible second half against Watford last weekend to register a morale-boosting 3-0 win in Germany against Eintracht Frankfurt and I am confident the lads will use that game as a launchpad to gather some momentum starting with a win over Aston Villa today.

It is never easy to guess what sort of team Unai Emery will put out but I am expecting an attack-minded line-up and using attack as the best form of defence.

This is an ideal game for the likes of Nicolas Pepe and Dani Ceballos to show their creativity and in fact, you can include Mesut Ozil in that as well.

Villa will be tough opponents but they will struggle to contain the Arsenal frontline and will be reduced to counter-attack football and so it is imperative that the Arsenal midfield and defence are on their game today, there cannot be any silly errors.

A lot will depend on what sort of midfield Emery puts out. The likes of Jack Grealish and John McGinn have to be shackled or they will cause damage and so it is important that the likes of Granit Xhaka and Matteo Guendouzi do their jobs today or whoever Emery picks.

As long as the players do the basics of their jobs they will emerge the winners, they are not playing a top-six side and if they cannot beat the likes of Aston Villa at the Emirates then Arsenal is in far more trouble than any of us realised.

Predicted score

Arsenal 3-0 Aston Villa