Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest players ‘moving towards a duel’ – Manager with big choice to make

Belgium are’moving towards a showdown’ between Nottingham Forest’s Orel Mangala and Aston Villa’s Youri Tielemans.

According to Sud Info and journalist Guillaume Raedts, a rivalry between the two for a midfield slot with Everton’s Amadou Onana seems unavoidable.

The concept of Mangala and Tielemans competing was first mentioned this week, with the Nottingham Forest player stating that there was no fight between him and the Aston Villa player when asked about it.

The fact, however, is that multiple players are battling for one spot on the club, and Domenico Tedesco must select what is best for his team.

Sud Info state that while youngster Mandela Keita is also in the squad his youth and lack of service means he’s unlikely to be number one choice. So the country are ‘moving towards a duel’ between the Nottingham Forest and Aston Villa men.

Tielemans, on the oth

er hand, has ‘enough of experience’ at international level, having earned 64 caps, the fourth most in the current group.
He, on the other hand, has been carrying the previous several months, if not years, ‘like a burden’ in the national team, a place where he has never achieved his finest performances.

That’s certainly been evident against some of the stronger clubs, when he’s struggled with their pressure and generally had a ‘hard time’.

Meanwhile, Mangala has ‘definitely scored points’ since Tedesco’s arrival, most notably against Germany in Cologne.

He has the ‘physical dimension’ that the Belgium boss wants and has proved to be a good partner for Onana when deployed as such. Those things would seemingly put him ahead of Tielemans for now.

There is also the option of all three being used in a different system, but for now that hasn’t happened and it seems a battle is on between Mangala and Tielemans, despite the latter insisting that isn’t the case.