Paul Merson tells Aston Villa to start ‘good signing’ at Sunderland as score prediction made

Add as preferred source on Google

Aston Villa cult hero Paul Merson has urged Unai Emery to start a player he has described as a “good signing” in Sunday’s Premier League trip to Sunderland.

The Villans have had a woeful start to the season, picking up just one point from four Premier League games and exiting the Carabao Cup at the hands of Brentford.

In addition, Aston Villa are yet to score a goal in the Premier League, though they did at least get off the mark in the midweek Carabao Cup trip to London.

With Villa now heading to Sunderland this weekend, Paul Merson has named the new signings he wants to see in Unai Emery’s XI as he delivered his score prediction.

READ MORE: Liverpool fans love what Harvey Elliott posted on Instagram during Reds’ Atletico clash, ‘always one of us’

Paul Merson urges Aston Villa to start Harvey Elliott at Sunderland

Not all of Villa’s signings have done well, with Evann Guessand being criticised by Villa fans for how he did against Brentford and Jadon Sancho also struggling.

However, Harvey Elliott was one of Villa’s best players on the night, scoring on his first start for the club and being a thorn in Brentford’s side for much of his time on the pitch.

Merson has now urged Emery to hand Elliott his first Premier League start in claret and blue.

“This Villa team doesn’t whet my appetite,” Merson wrote on Sportskeeda.

“When I saw them last season, they looked like a proper team. Now I look at them and it’s the exact opposite!

“Harvey Elliott is a good signing and he has to be in the starting line-up for this game.”

Despite not thinking highly of Villa at present, Merson still feels they have enough to bag a 1-0 win away at Sunderland.

“It’s true that when you don’t score goals as a team, you lose a lot of confidence,” continued Merson.

“But I expect Villa’s quality to get them over the line in the end here.”

Plenty of Elliott’s peers expressed their delight with his midweek display, Lucas Digne posting three fire emojis on Elliott’s post-game Instagram post.

Meanwhile, Matty Cash posted an upward arrow captioned ‘top’, while Guessand posted three smiley-heart emojis and Tyler Morton wrote “what a guy”.

READ MORE: Sunderland vs Aston Villa: TV channel, live stream, referee pick, injury news and more

Aston Villa team news vs Sunderland

Aston Villa are set to be without Youri Tielemans, Amadou Onana, Andres Garcia and Ross Barkley for the trip to Sunderland.

However, Boubacar Kamara is available after he came off the bench in midweek, while Victor Lindelof hopes to be in contention too.

Meanwhile, Sunderland will be boosted by the return of Dan Ballard and Enzo Le Fee after both recovered from their respective injuries.

However, Luke O’Nien needs a few more weeks before he is fully fit, while Dennis Cirkin is also expected to miss out once again.