Dean Smith excited for 'Battle of the Brits' against Leicester

| 20 February 2021

Villa's defence of Tyrone Mings and Ezri Konsa will come up against the Foxes attack of Jamie Vardy and James Maddison.

Aston Villa boss Dean Smith believes Sunday's home Premier League game against Leicester will showcase some of England's best talent.

Villa are looking to close the gap on the top six, while Leicester will climb second with victory if Manchester United drop points on Sunday against Newcastle at Old Trafford.

Smith's side have kept 12 clean sheets in the top flight this season, with Tyrone Mings and Ezri Konsa key to a solid defence which aims to shackle Foxes pair Jamie Vardy and James Maddison.

"There will be duels certainly, with Tyrone and Konsa I would have thought against Vardy and Maddison," Smith said.

"We've got quite a British base among our players anyway and they've got some very good English players as well, so it makes for a really interesting game.

"We had a really tight game at the King Power (in October), which we managed to win in the last minute and there's certainly going to be some really good duels to look out for."

Villa skipper Jack Grealish will not want to be upstaged by either Maddison or another in-form England team-mate, Harvey Barnes, who scored his 12th goal of the season in all competitions in last week's win against Liverpool.

"Harvey Barnes has been doing brilliantly this season and you all know my feelings on how Jack's been doing," Smith said.

When asked if Grealish and Maddison would be compatible in England's starting line-up, Smith said: "There's no reason why not.

"But that's not my decision to make. That's the England manager's decision to make.

"I think they're different players and they've shown they can play in different positions as well for their clubs this season, so thankfully I don't have to make that decision."

Smith believes Grealish has thrived under the closer attention he has received from opposing sides since forcing his way into Gareth Southgate's starting XI.

"I think he's always been a marked man," Smith added. "Ever since I've been at the club teams have their own plan for him, as we would for top players of other teams.

"He's usually come up with ways to get around their plans for him and I actually find with Jack, he wants to come up with solutions.

"I think that's what gets his juices flowing, to come up with a solution to a problem that he encounters and more often than not he comes up with one."