Aston Villa’s opening 3 games are the best ones in the league according to FDR with all of them rated 2. Keeping this in mind you must have atleast 2 players in your team for the start of the season. One hiccup might be that their next 4 fixtures are all rated 4. So, you can either transfer them out slowly once they have paid dividends for you in the initial games. However, if you are doing an early wildcard you should most definitely triple up on them as the international break is coming after the 3rd GW only.
Tyrone Mings (£5.0m)
Picking Tyron Mings over Matt Targett (£5.0m) was not as hard a decision as one would expect. Last season Mings had 2 goals and 2 assists while Targett had only 2 assists and their xG+A are 2.5 and 3.3 respectively. This means that Mings highly overperformed while Targett underperformed but it is the underlying stats that were very surprising considering Targett is a full back while Mings is a centre back.
Targett has 24 shots, 9 on target in the last 3 seasons while Mings has 19 shots, 7 on target in the previous season alone. Hence, Mings is a much higher goal scoring threat that Targett. Although Targett’s xA, Key passes and crosses are heads and shoulders higher than those of Mings, they still have the same number of assists for the last season and a similar comparison can be drawn for the season before. Lastly, with the return of Premier League veteran Ashley Young (£5.0m), Matt Targett and Matty Cash (£5.0m) are bound to have their minutes reduced.
Emiliano Buendia (£6.5m)
Emi Buendia took his game to a whole new level last season scoring 15 goals and bagging 15 assists last season in the Championship. He was arguably their most influential player in their conquest to win the title and making their way back to the PL. His goals to shot on target ratio per 90 is 0.38 which is higher than the likes of Mohammed Salah, Bruno Fernandes and Sergio Aguero.
This shows he is an extremely clinical player and scores frequently. Although most players take time to come into a new team and get into the stride of things, Buendia has started his Aston Villa career with an absolute banger of a performance assisting Ollie Watkins twice in 45 minutes against Walsall.
Jack Grealish (£8.0m)
The English playmaker is the most expensive Aston Villa FPL asset and with good reason. He has been a consistent performer for the past 2 seasons and he comes at a cut short price. With Ollie Watkins firing on all cylinders and Emi Buendia coming in as a new signing opening a new dangerous attacking outlet Jack Grealish should have higher numbers as well.
His Key Passes per 90 of 3.42 are the second highest in the league only after Kevin De Bruyne. He had 6 goals and 10 assists last season, and his 10 assist last season were the 4th and what makes it even more impressive is that he missed 12 games due to injury last season.
Ollie Watkins (£7.5m)
The top scorer in the Premier League last season among the teams in the bottom half of the league, Ollie Watkins scored 14 goals and assisted 5 goals last season. One thing to note is that he was able to put up these numbers with Jack Grealish out of commission for 3 months.
With the arrival of Emi Buendia and both of them linking up quite impressively, these numbers are bound to increase this season. His xG of 16.0 last season was the 5th highest of the season and his 45 shots on target are the 4th highest of the season. At 7.5 million he is perhaps the best mid price asset you can have in your team.
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