Middlesbrough vs Aston Villa

Riverside Stadium forms the backdrop for an exciting FA Cup third-round tie between second-tier Middlesbrough and top-flight high-flyers Aston Villa.

Middlesbrough slumped to a woeful 3-1 defeat to Coventry City in their opening Championship fixture of 2024. In addition to missing almost a dozen players, manager Michael Carrick can’t rely on a schedule either, with a mouth-watering League Cup semi-final against Chelsea waiting in the wings. Beating Aston Villa would lift the spirits around the home camp, yet Boro’s dismal run of three defeats in their last four outings at the Riverside doesn’t offer many reasons for optimism (W1). It’s also worth noting they’ve conceded 2+ goals in all three defeats in that sequence, casting doubt on their capacity to fend off Villa’s free-flowing frontline.

Meanwhile, Aston Villa capped off a transformative 2023 on a high, netting late to topple 10-man Burnley 3-2 at home and consolidate their position in a closely-contested Premier League top-four race. Unai Emery’s men had only lost once in 12 competitive games toward the end of 2023 (W8, D3) and will be keen to kick off 2024 in a similar vein. But achieving that feat will require the ‘Lions’ to defy their underwhelming away form, having won just once on their last four travels (D2, L1). ‘Boro’ could be just the opposition to help Villa improve on the road, considering they’ve shut them out in five straight H2Hs (W4, D1) since a 2-0 League Cup loss in 2017.