Aston Villa v Southampton - Match Preview

A record of just four wins from 12 Premier League matches in front of their own supporters is some way short of what a team with aspirations of challenging in the top half of the table would expect.

There have been some sobering defeats along the way too, to the likes of Wolves and West Ham. Villa’s last match on home turf, a 1-0 defeat to Watford, saw Steven Gerrard and his players booed off.

Spirits will be higher before kick-off tomorrow after last weekend’s win at Brighton stopped the rot but the onus is on Villa as they look to secure what would be a first home win in three months.

The task will be far from easy against a Southampton team currently in as good a form as anyone in the division. Ralph Hasenhuttl’s men have taken 11 of the last 15 points available, a run which started with a deserved 1-1 draw against Manchester City. Wednesday night’s FA Cup win over West Ham was their third on the spin in all competitions and they will be aiming to extend an unbeaten run at Villa Park which stretches back six matches and 18 years. That includes wins on each of their last three visits.

Among the players on the scoresheet for the Saints in the last two of those was Danny Ings, the striker who will tomorrow hope to come face-to-face with his former club for the first time since moving to the Midlands for £25million last summer. Ings missed November’s 1-0 defeat at St Mary’s Stadium, in what turned out to be Dean Smith’s final match in charge, due to injury. All told, his first campaign in claret and blue has been frustratingly stop-start.

Both Ings and Villa would have expected more than the four-goal return he has managed so far.

But he has started the last two matches and it is likely Gerrard will persevere with the system which worked effectively at Brighton, with Ings and Ollie Watkins paired together up front.

For all the money Villa have invested in their squad and the belief they have the potential to field an expansive, attacking team, nearly all their wins this season have been achieved with a pragmatic, safety-first approach.

Southampton, tipped to struggle this season after selling Ings and Jannik Vestergaard, sit five points ahead of Villa in ninth and when yesterday assessing the financial strength of both clubs, Hasenhuttl made the point it is how you spend money, rather than the amount, which really matters.

“When you see financial strength, I think they are investing more than we do,” he said.

“They took our best striker for a lot of money and they are very ambitious. But we are also, with our limits we have as a club.

“You see that it’s not only about how much money you spend, it’s also about how you spent it. For us, we had a very good transfer window in the summer.”