Sky Sports pundit David Prutton believes that Aston Villa boss Dean Smith will go back to his former club Brentford to see the “building blocks he has put in place” when the two sides face off on Wednesday.
Villa managed to scrape a 3-3 draw with Sheffield United on Friday night – something which Prutton has labelled as showing “tremendous spirit” – but the two points dropped means that they now sit in tenth place in the Championship on 44 points, six points from the play-off places.
Prutton predicts that the scoreline will be 2-2 between the two teams at Griffin Park, but said that there are some doubts about Villa.
“This should be a very good game. Villa showed tremendous spirit and fight to come back from 3-0 down to draw 3-3 with Sheffield United last Friday. Dean Smith could mitigate that parts of the game went against them, with Billy Sharp’s second goal being both offside and a foul,” he said in his Sky Sports predictions.
“Definitively, there are question marks over Villa and the kind of football Brentford can produce on occasion is breathtaking, to be honest. I think the irony of that is that Dean will go back and see the building blocks that he put in place.”
OPINION
Villa were lucky to scrape a draw on Friday night with a stoppage time goal, as although Prutton says they showed good spirit, they were not the better team on the say. Sheffield United were by far the better side and it must have been a shame for them to drop two points so late on into the clash. Nevertheless, Villa still have work to do seeing as they are in tenth place and it does not look like it will start at Brentford if Prutton’s prediction is anything to go by. With the likes of Tammy Abraham in the side, you would think that Villa would be flying, but no. They have struggled to string a couple of wins together, and their play-off hopes look to be fading with every match they play. There are question marks over Villa, just as the pundit has pointed out – and a draw looks the most likely result based on their current form.