• 1
  Villa won the Europa League last season and finished fourth in the Premier League, yet somehow arrive at this one without a single win or even a goal in three league games. Forest, under brand new boss Oliver Glasner, are in exactly the same boat — three games, no win, first time that's happened to them in the Premier League. Whoever wins this gets to stop talking about how bad their start has been. Whoever loses is staring at the relegation zone by lunchtime, trophy cabinet or not.
• 2
  Villa have won each of their last six Premier League meetings with Forest at Villa Park, so history is heavily on the home side's side. It gets more lopsided than that too — this exact fixture decided last season's Europa League semi-final, and Villa won it 4-1 on aggregate by scoring all four goals in the second leg, at Villa Park, in front of their own fans. Forest fans would understandably like to not think about that.
• 3
  John McGinn is the only reason Villa have had anything to cheer about lately — his strike at Club Brugge in midweek was Villa's first goal of the Champions League campaign, in a game they somehow won 3-2 having just been held goalless by Hull City in the league three days earlier. He's Villa's captain, their engine, and right now basically their entire attacking output. If Villa are going to end their Premier League goal drought today, the smart money says he's involved somehow.
• 4
  Villa spent the summer waving goodbye to half their spine — Ollie Watkins, Morgan Rogers, Ezri Konsa, Youri Tielemans and Emiliano Martinez are all gone — and Unai Emery is currently trying to glue a Premier League attack back together with the pieces left over, hence zero goals in three games. Forest's problem is different but just as pressing: Oliver Glasner has taken over from Vitor Pereira and hasn't won a single match yet in any competition, four games in. One of these two managers gets to feel a lot better about their week; the other one doesn't.
• 5
  This is a genuinely rare collision: two Premier League clubs both still searching for their first league win of the season, level on points, level on goals for (zero, in Villa's case). Forest have never before failed to win any of their opening three Premier League games, so there's an unwanted club record on the line if they don't turn it around here. Somebody's miserable start ends today. The other one just gets more uncomfortable.

• 1
  Aston Villa tore up most of their spine this summer, selling Morgan Rogers to Chelsea for £120m — the biggest transfer fee ever paid between two English clubs. Bring that stat up and watch a Villa fan wince and nod at the same time.
• 2
  Villa's World Cup-winning goalkeeper Emiliano Martínez also left for Chelsea, for a fee that raised eyebrows — just £7.5m for a player of that pedigree. It says a lot about how much the club wanted the wages off their books rather than about his ability.
• 3
  Coming the other way was striker Nicolas Jackson, arriving from Chelsea for £65m, in a summer where the two clubs basically swapped chunks of their squads. Point that irony out and you'll sound sharper than most pundits on the radio phone-in.
• 4
  With Ollie Watkins also gone (to Al Hilal) and a host of new faces still bedding in, Unai Emery is effectively rebuilding on the fly. It's the kind of overhaul that needs patience — worth telling whoever you're talking to not to judge this Villa side on early results alone.
• 5
  The bright spot: Villa beat Club Brugge 3-2 in their Champions League opener, their first win of the campaign. Handy to know if you want to sound like you're following more than just the league table.

• 1
  Forest have just appointed their fifth manager in twelve months: Oliver Glasner, who arrives fresh from guiding Crystal Palace through the best spell in that club's history — an FA Cup, a Community Shield and a Europa Conference League title in two and a half seasons.
• 2
  He's inheriting a club that's burned through Nuno Espírito Santo, Ange Postecoglou, Sean Dyche and Vitor Pereira in barely a year, so his first job is basically just convincing everyone he'll still be there at Christmas.
• 3
  Forest sold Anthony Elanga to Newcastle for £55m over the summer — a reminder that even Forest's good news stories, like developing a genuine Premier League winger, tend to end with someone else cashing in on the result.
• 4
  Their opening weeks have been settling-in territory rather than statement-making: a 0-0 at home to Tottenham where Forest actually had a goal ruled out for handball on the line by VAR in the 67th minute.
• 5
  With that much managerial change at the City Ground, 'stability' is now doing a lot of work in every article written about Forest — Glasner's entire pitch is that he's the one who can actually make it stick this time.