Villa – Spurs; It’s in our own hands now.

Pessimistic me shares the concerns that some of us have about Spurs being very capable of scoring at Villa Park on their day.

But even I have to tend to the view that we should win this quite comfortably.

I know, it’s brave of me but the requirement is quite simple for the rest of the season. Win our 2 final games. Emery will have drummed it into the players, although I doubt they’d have needed to be told.

Win these two games and what will be, will be. Plain and simple and anything less won’t be acceptable.

It might not even be enough for us to qualify for the Champions League, but if we can succeed in our final push, that’s it. We can do no more.

So saying we will win is a bit of a bold statement, but come on, if we can’t beat these, we don’t deserve to qualify anyway. We could probably not have had a better time to play them, all season, given that they face Man Utd in the Europa league final on Wednesday. Everyone in their side is going to want to play in it and there’s no way any of them will be giving any extra tonight. It wouldn’t even surprise me if Postecoglou has told them to take it easy. They have nothing to play for in the league and can’t be relegated, after all. Will Ange even play his first team?

I won’t even go into their current form. Well, I will do, but in a minute.

Squad news then and it’s very straightforward. Tielemans is out with a calf injury, Rashford is out with a hamstring issue and Ramsey is suspended after his very soft second yellow last week. I say soft and it was, but he should never have got himself booked the first time.

As for Spurs, the good news for us (but not the player, obviously) is that Dejan Kulusevski has undergone knee surgery. James Maddison and Lucas Bergvall are both out too and it’s quite odd, as I haven’t heard Ange bleating on about how he thinks they’re the only club to get injuries lately?

Son is due to get at least a few minutes after being out for a month.

It’s probably all a bit academic anyway, if the Greek (why did I think he was Australian?) decides to not field a full strength side.

And then there’s current form.

We’re the only team to have won 5 out of 6 of our last games, while Spurs’ form is abysmal. In their last 6, they’ve won 1, drawn 1 and lost 4. That’s relegation form.

Normally, I would be saying that we’re heading for a typical Aston Villa type fall here, but I just can’t see it. Yes, a small part of me knows it’s very possible, but even so, in my head losing against them is simply not an option.

I’ve loved watching Spurs all season. They’ve been my favourite and “go to” team, Villa apart and I always look out for them playing. The reason is simple. They are (or at least, were) either great or terrible and their games always give you goals.

And I fail to see anything different tonight.

I’m going for a 3-1 win. The only thing we have to fear here is complacency.

UTV