View: Aston Villa should play Tyrone Mings to purely mark Erling Haaland
After four defeats in the opening five matches, the last thing Aston Villa want to face this weekend is an inform Erling Haaland and Manchester City.
But unfortunately for Steven Gerrard, that is what awaits the Villans on Saturday and the former England international might have to get creative in his tactics.
In a way, this game is something of a free hit for Aston Villa this early in the season because there won’t be anybody outside of Villa Park expecting them to win.
That means Gerrard can take a big gamble in his selection but it might be the answer to containing the City machine and their monstrous new number nine.
It doesn’t take much for Haaland to find the space to score when he has the creative masterminds of Kevin de Bruyne, Phil Foden and Bernardo Silva behind him.
Against Nottingham Forest, the Norwegian had himself a hat-trick and the first goal only saw him run maybe two or three yards to get in front of his marker and divert the ball home.
He was then left hopelessly unmarked minutes later before a quick one-two with Foden to double his tally for the evening as the newly-promoted side crumbled at The Etihad.
Villa will be more than aware already that you can’t leave such a potent striker free to take his time at any moment and they will be conjuring up plans to resolve the potential problem.
His hat-trick goal was all down to his incredible jumping ability but that can be nullified by Aston Villa if they think outside the box.
This might be the chance for Gerrard to play a back five for once and have Tyrone Mings in the side solely to stay touch tight to Haaland where he can almost forget about where the ball is.
In other Aston Villa news, as well as the two late signings, the Villans were looking to resurrect a previous deal on deadline day.