Steven Gerrard might well have been one man who would have preferred to have seen his club's game with Saints called off due to the Queen's funeral, as he is faced with having perhaps four players missing from his squad.

If Arry Redknapp, was managing Aston Villa and I'm sure he is around if Stevie G needs him, then he would now be claiming to be down to the bare bones for Villa's game against Saints.

He has one long term injury in the shape of Diego Carlos, the central defender suffered an achilles injury in his debut for the club and is set to miss the season or at least most of it.

Gerrard signed Saints central defender Jan Bednarek on a season long loan to cover the loss of Carlos, although the Pole seems to have read that as five year long term deal and the team built around him judging by his comments on arriving at Villa Park, perhaps the fact his name on his locker was written in chalk should have been a clue.

Of course Bednarek cannot play against his parent club, so will be in the stands on Friday evening willing Villa on, either way, that is a blow to Gerrard in that he will have little cover now on the bench in the centre half region.

Perhaps the biggest miss will be Matty Cash, the full/wing back who like Bednarek plays for the Polish International side having been born in Slough ( I am not sure how that is pronounced, these Polish towns have weird names). Cash is out with a hamstring injury that will see him missing from the Villa squad until after the international break.

The fourth player likely to be missing is another new signing Leander Dendoncker, the experienced Belgian international played 4 Premier League games for Wolves this season before signing for Villa just before the end of the transfer window, however after sitting out his first game on the bench for his new club, he developed tonsillitis, so has yet to make his debut for Villa.

He could play against Saints, but given his illness and the fact that he now won't have played in almost a month and indeed not completed 90 minutes since 13th August he is likely to start on the bench again.

So Villa will definitely be without 3 of their squad for the visit of Saints and will have a fourth with little game time since the start of the season, good news for Saints supporters, although we will be missing Romeo Lavia ourselves, although at present that looks to be the only player missing through injury.

Photo: Action Images

ElijahK added 11:24 - Sep 13 I’m pretty sure Livermento is also out still injured but yeah should be just those two, although when is it that Lavia is meant to be back as many said originally that it could be by the Everton game but has any of that changed since then?
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