Aston Villa's Reserves Kick Off

Things should be underway in Manchester as Aston Villa's Reserves take on Manchester City's Reser-excuse me, Manchester City's Elite Development Squad (seriously) in the opening game of the Barclay's Premier Reserve League this evening.

Villa's lineup:

Parish; Berry, Clark, Baker, Lowry; Lichaj, Carruthers, Hogg, Johnson; Burke, Collins Jr.

According to a few different accounts on Twitter, Eric Lichaj is playing in central defense this evening. I mention that not because of my well-documented Lichaj obsession but because as far as I can remember I've never seen or heard of Lichaj playing anywhere but fullback. I'm all for getting the youngsters experience at as many positions as possible, and some more flexibility would have been nice early on in the season with Cuellar, Collins and Dunne all out of action for a time. One of the great things about following along with the reserve squad games is the ability to notice this sort of thing to get an idea of what the club is thinking as they go forward.

You can follow along with the live text on the OS here, and audio commentary is available for AVTV subscribers.