Leicester vs Aston Villa: Preview and Prediction

Both clubs need the points for very different reasons as they clash on Monday evening at King Power Stadium.

 

Manchester City lost at the weekend and so Leicester have the opportunity to cut their lead in 2nd to 4 points. However the biggest concern for the Foxes is keeping 3rd or even 4th place as both Chelsea and Manchester United are catching up to them. Leicester have just a 2 point lead over Chelsea in 4th and a 5 point lead over United, and within a few weeks that advantage could be gone. This is something that Leicester manager Brendan Rodgers will have to install into his players who have worked too hard this season to see it all come down to very little.

 

The worry for the home side is that their recent form has been poor with no wins in their last 4 games. True they have had some tough fixtures playing the likes of Chelsea and Manchester City but the Foxes have not won a game since the end of January when they demolished West Ham at home.

 

Aston Villa would climb out of the bottom three with a win, so this really is a huge match for Dean Smith’s side. Whilst they are in 19th place they have a crucial 2 games in hand over the teams surrounding them due to their Carabao Cup final game.

 

Villa have lost 3 consecutive games though coming into this game, with their last league game ending in a 2-0 defeat at Southampton, where they were utterly dominated. Like Leicester, Villa have not tasted a win since January and on the road they have lost 10 games from 14 played. The club are conceding 2 goals per game on average away from home.

 

 

 

Leicester: Ben Chilwell is a doubt for the game with a minor hamstring injury and will be assessed, he is the only new injury concern for the club.

 

Aston Villa: Whilst the club have some long term injuries they are reporting no new cases leading up to this game.

 

 

 

The last time the clubs met in a league match here was in 2015 when Leicester won 3-2.

 

The clubs met here in January in the Carabao Cup with the game finishing 1-1.

 

Aston Villa have not beaten Leicester away in 4 attempts going back to 2006, which was in the league cup.

 

 

 

Leicester will start as the favourites and obviously so being the club in 3rd place compared to 19th. At the same time form has not been good for the club who lost to the bottom team Norwich last weekend. There are doubts over their stamina and Villa certainly will not be afraid to come here and go for the win. Villa got the better of Leicester in the EFL Cup, and will try to carry that confidence into this encounter. At the same time Leicester look too good to continue their bad run and they will be out for revenge after their EFL Cup exit. Not many people will be betting against them to get the three points on Monday night, and we wont either.

 

It’s been interesting to see that Jamie Vardy’s goals have dried up and considering they are back at home against the 2nd to bottom side one wonders if he can get back on scoring terms again?

 

 

 

Leicester to beat Aston Villa at 1.50

 

Anytime goalscorer: Jamie Vardy at 1.79