When looking at how the preseason continues to progress for Aston Villa, there is a lot that can be seen in terms of the overall vision of Unai Emery for the upcoming campaign.
This past year, the Villa boss stuck with a 4-2-3-1 for many of the matches. So far, Emery has shown a willingness to try different formations and has placed players in different areas. Although a lot of that can be explained by the fact that it is a friendly, it does speak to Emery's likely desire to be able to be more flexible compared to the 2024-2025 campaign.
This has also been a summer of action that has seen the attack look quite good already at this point in the preparations. While not outright looking to press like some of the other sides, it is a Villa team that appears eager to capitalize on a slight mistouch.
Focusing more on the positives for Aston Villa
Not quite with an in-your-face presence, the opposition certainly knows that the Villans are right there at that next level of the pitch. As has been seen with John McGinn, for example, though this has been the case since he joined Villa, the midfielder does well to then switch from defending to attacking, getting the ball quickly up the pitch and going the other way.
From Donyell Malen in particular, things are looking quite good in terms of how things ultimately progress from Villa in the final third.
On the other end of the pitch, dealing with how to best counter-press is something that continues to need to be worked on. Once the Newcastle United match is over, Emiliano Martínez still looks as sharp as ever. In the event of the Argentina international not being able to play in any match, for whatever reason, though, Marco Bizot certainly looks more than capable of filling in at any point in time for Villa.