Ipswich Town v Aston Villa predictions as one pundit 'sticks their neck out' plus 'distractions' warning delivered

Pundits like Jamie Carragher, Roy Keane, Paul Merson and Mark Lawrenson have waded in on the Ipswich Town v Aston Villa debate ahead of this weekend's Premier League meeting

Aston Villa are now officially competing on three fronts at once, with focus quickly shifting back towards Premier League duties and a trip to Ipswich Town this weekend.

During the week Unai Emery's men ensured advancement in the League Cup against Wycombe Wanderers, setting up a fourth round tie with Crystal Palace next month. So far based on the challenges many predicted were to come Villa's way, momentum is fully in their favour - and that needs to continue.

The longest and most gruelling of these tasks will be to navigate the Premier League for the 2024/25 campaign, and so their next task will be to face newly-promoted Ipswich Town at Portman Road. Kieran McKenna's side are yet to win a match since returning to the division, though have only lost to Liverpool and Manchester City so far.

So, will the team running third in the league standings find themselves on the wrong end of an upset? It seems plenty of pundits are backing the away result, however there is still one whose verdict the visitors must heed heading into the weekend.

Predicting that the Tractor Boys could come away with a 2-1 victory and kickstart their season, Mark Lawrenson told Paddy Power: "I’m going to stick my neck out and have this as my upset of the weekend. Ipswich have got better every game and they put up a good fight, at the very least, every match."

What's more, he added: "Jhon Duran scored again off the bench, I bet he’s one of those who’s lethal off the bench but goes missing if he starts. We’ll see."

Whilst Paul Merson could not agree about the result, suggesting the visitors will be 2-0 victors to Sportskeeda, he did issue a warning to his former club about the dangers of having one eye on Champions League football's return to Villa Park next week.

"They play Bayern Munich in the Champions League at Villa Park after this game, who would've thought that 10 years ago?

"They can't get distracted by that game because they have to sort this one out first. You don't want to be the first team beaten by Ipswich. I actually feel Ipswich can cause Villa problems early in the game, but if the visitors can ride that early pressure and keep their attitude right, they will get over the line easily by the end of the game."

Giving more confident-boosting verdicts for Villa, first up was Chris Sutton. Predicting a 2-1 scoreline in Villa's favour, he wrote for BBC Sport: "I don't see them [Ipswich] getting anything here, though. Aston Villa do concede goals, and are already fighting on all fronts so this is a test of their squad. Ipswich will have a go and I think they will score, but again I think that Villa will have too much for them."

And finally The Overlap's Stick to Football podcast team submitted their Super Six predictions for the weekend, which included Villa's clash in the South East.

Roy Keane said: "Villa, all day," as he, Ian Wright and Jill Scott agreed it would end 2-1 to Villa. Concurring with the result, on the opposite side of the table Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher believe it will be 2-0 for the away team, with the latter adding: "No one's beating Martinez."

Will Villa beat Ipswich this weekend? Give your predictions HERE