Highlights: Cherki scores the winning goal and helps Manchester City beat Nottingham Forest
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With 11 consecutive wins in all competitions, Aston Villa are in 3rd place, seven points behind fourth-placed Liverpool and 10 points behind fifth-placed Chelsea. They are one point behind second-place Manchester City and three points behind leaders Arsenal.
Speaking to Sky Sports after the win, Watkins said: “(It was a great win). Personally, it felt great to come out and score two goals, but it’s great to keep this form going and come here, in a difficult place, and beat Chelsea.”
Watkins also praised Emery for making some tactical tweaks to get Chelsea through the back line, explaining:
“When I came on in the second half, he put Jadon Sancho and Morgan Rodgers on the wing and put Youri Tielemans in No. 10. So we put another player in there. He’s a tactical genius.”
Villa currently enter the new year in the top three and Watkins believes they are a team capable of intimidating other teams in the league.
He added: “I feel like the team cares about us, even though we may not play our best football sometimes. We’re taking each game as it comes and we’re really focused on ourselves.”
“There’s a lot of talk about us and some people are asking if we can win the title, but it’s a long way off. We’re just focused on the next game.”
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Emery: “We will ‘fight strong’ against Arsenal”
Villa manager Emery is scheduled to face his former club Arsenal on Tuesday night.
If his side win 12 games in a row, they will be level on points with Mikel Arteta’s side.
The Spaniard said the team would go there with the aim of sustaining itself, but his ambitions were not ahead of the curve.
He told the BBC: “We’re playing against Arsenal and our mentality is to compete strongly. And we’re not going to talk about our goals in the league until week 34[of the game]because there are teams like Liverpool and Chelsea who are really fighting for points and they’re fighting harder than us to stay there.”
“Of course, we are performing very well, winning games in a row and competing great. In the first half we played great, but we were struggling. But in the second half, more or less like this season, we are gradually getting better and humbler.”
He denied thinking his side were in the race for a Premier League spot, saying: “No, 38 games. If we finish tomorrow, this game against Arsenal is the league (winner). There are still 20 games left.”
