On Sunday, Aston Villa will go to Brentford in an attempt to keep up their pressure on Arsenal and Liverpool for the top spot in the Premier League rankings.

Bryan Mbeumo will not only miss this weekend’s match against Aston Villa, but also every other match for the following three months, according to Thomas Frank. The attacker’s ankle injury sustained in last weekend’s 2-1 loss to Brighton has forced surgery, and he will also miss the Africa Cup of Nations, which is devastating news for both the Bees and Mbuemo.

Nathan Collins, a summer transfer from Wolves, is a defender who might make a comeback against Unai Emery’s team, but Josh Dasilva and Mathias Jensen have also added their names to the list of injured players.

According to head coach Thomas Frank, Bryan is an optimistic person. Though difficult to accept, he will bounce back stronger. He is really well-aware. We’ve had some injury struggles almost from the first game, but we still have a strong roster of players who aren’t afraid to put in a hard fight.

We never jump into anything headfirst, but we should examine it in January. We make an effort to be astute and make cool, collected conclusions. If we don’t believe a player is here to stay, we won’t accept them. Perhaps this time a loan, but that will depend on events over the course of the following three to four weeks.

Villa go into Sunday’s game on the back of a very quick turnaround having played in Bosnia and Herzegovina on Thursday night. Here’s the full Brentford squad for the match.

Defenders : Charles Goode, Ethan Pinnock, Nathan Collins, Ben Mee, Pontus Jansson, Mathias Jorgensen, Mads Bech Sörensen, Mads Roerslev Rasmussen

Midfielders : Christian Norgaard, Keane Lewis-Potter, Myles Peart-Harris, Shandon Baptiste, Vitaly Janelt, Yehor Yarmoliuk, Ethan Brierley, Frank Ogochukwu Onyeka

Strikers : Neal Maupay, Yoane Wissa, Saman Ghoddos, Mikkel Damsgaard, Michael Olakigbe

Not available : Ivan Toney, Mathias Jensen, Bryan Mbeumo, Rico Henry. Aaron Hickey, Kevin Schade, Josh Dasilva, Kristoffer Ajer