Aston Villa Join The Grid In This Season’s Title Race

Dan Tracey

Editor

Last updated: Sat 20 Dec 2025 09:21

Dan Tracey 20 Dec 2025

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Aston Villa's victory over Arsenal propels them into the title race.
Under Unai Emery, Villa is on a six-game winning streak.
Ollie Watkins is key for Villa's title hopes with more expected goals.

Aston Villa coach Unai Emery (Getty Images)

One of the key selling points of any Premier League season is that there are going to be upsets along the way and although Aston Villa’s recent home win over Arsenal was not the biggest shock of the campaign so far, it certainly had a destabilising effect on the latest title race.

Unai Emery’s men earning three points over the Gunners in dramatic fashion, victory that also put them just three points behind the current league leaders. Their Villa Park lunchtime showdown concluding with a big question being asked.

Are Aston Villa in this season’s title race? As of that moment they certainly where but a win over the league’s gold standard would count for little if they could not follow up with maximum points just eight days later.

A trip to West Ham followed. A trip that got off to the worst possible start when the Hammers scored within the first minute but a trip that ended in the best possible fashion when Morgan Rogers scored the winner with only 11 minutes remaining.

The kind of performance which means the West Midlands outfit can back up key results such as the Arsenal win. The kind of performance that if it can be replicated over the Christmas period and beyond will mean punters and pundits will have to start taking Villa even more seriously.

Before the weekend’s visit of Manchester United, the Villa Park outfit have won each of their last six league outings under manager Unai Emery - a run that is currently the longest winning streak in the division.

While it is a run that can easily silence any detractors, those same voices believe a blip will hamper them soon. A blip that arguably has already happened when you consider just how sluggish their start to the season actually was.

No win in their first five league outings, just two points from the first 15 on offer. Questions being asked about a club potentially in crisis. A club looking to avoid the Championship rather than win one.

On The Charge

However, since their first win of the season was recorded at the expense of Fulham in late September, Villa have almost been faultless. 11 league outings from beating the Cottagers 3-1 to winning at West Ham 3-2, an incredible 10 wins recorded.

The only misstep was the 2-0 defeat at Liverpool at the start of November – a result that will perhaps rankle further when you consider just how out of sorts the defending league champions have been since the clocks went back.

Liverpool going back down the league, Villa doing their best to continue their march up it and with the transfer window opening in just a couple of weeks, the conversation regarding recruitment will only begin to get louder.

A team in the mix, may need one more part to push it from also-ran to champion but when you look at the composition of this Villa side, you do wonder what they actually need in order to improve what they already have.

You only have to look at previous examples of when a club has gone into the market in a title race and it then go south in no time at all. Those of a certain vintage will remember Faustino Asprilla’s addition to Newcastle’s ranks 30 years ago and how the title then slipped out the Magpies’ hands.

Which means if they do not need new players, it may be that they need even more from what they already have and if there is one player that can certainly offer more in the second half of the season, it has to be Ollie Watkins.

Needing Even More

The 29-year-old is currently in his sixth season at the club, in each of the previous five he has registered double figures when it comes to league goals. At the time of writing, the former Brentford man has recorded just three in this campaign.

Three goals in 16 league appearances in 2025/26. Of those 16, 14 of them have been in the starting eleven. Not enough output from Watkins, but thankfully other players have managed to pick up the slack during his absence on the scoresheet.

An absence that Villa fans will hope is far less regular in the second half of the season, if the man in question can add another 10 goals to the three already registered, that could well be the difference between being the best and being part of the rest.

With that being said, Villa’s attitude to scoring Premier League goals this season has been rather holistic. A far greater spread when it comes to positional deployment, a far greater distance from where the shots are taken in the first place.

That in itself could be a huge factor in Watkins’ low scoring numbers, he is simply not getting the same kind of service because his teammates feel a lot more confident when it comes to shooting from outside the area.

Is that sustainable across the course of 38 games? It will be if Villa’s unbeaten run continues and if it does, then the parallels with another outsider a decade previously will start to become further intwined.

When Leicester were going all the way in 2016, it was about this time in the season when the nation finally accepted that the Foxes were the real deal, the first signs were there when they beat Villa 3-2 at the King Power in September 2015.

That game saw the eventual title winners go two-nil down on 63 minutes, only to then score three unanswered strikes in the last 20 minutes. Maybe a flash in the pan that afternoon but Claudio Ranieri’s men were no flash in the pan just eight months later.

Now there is only five months of the season remaining and Arsenal have to welcome Villa to the Emirates in January. The recent defeat to Emi Buendia’s winner may not have defined the title race, a similar outcome in North London certainly will.