The long and arduous Championship season is drawing to a close and Villa still have a slim outside chance of earning automatic promotion to the Premier League thanks to their 4-0 demolition of Ipswich last Saturday.
With just two games remaining, Villa sit 4th in the table, 3 points behind Fulham in 3rd and 4 points behind Cardiff City in 2nd. This means that there is still a mathematical chance that Villa could snatch automatic promotion to the Premier League.
However, to do this, they would need to win their remaining two matches and hope that Fulham and Cardiff don’t pick up another win from their remaining games. This is a tall ask, but funnier things have happened in the world of football.
Next up for Villa is a home match against Derby, who kept their promotion hopes alive with a 3-1 victory against Cardiff on Tuesday evening. This won’t be an easy game, but we’re backing Villa to get another very important three points.
Here’s our predicted Villa XI for Saturday’s match against Derby.
