Many Fantasy Premier League (FPL) managers will be tempted to punt on an Aston Villa attacker this week, with interest chiefly focused on Nicolas Jackson (£6.8m) and Johan Manzambi (£6.0m).

Unai Emery’s men are, of course, poised for a superb upcoming run of fixtures…

But how do the Aston Villa pair measure up against one another?

We’ll explore Jackson and Manzambi’s Fantasy appeal below.

GOAL THREAT

A brace against Manchester City has taken Jackson to four goals in seven league matches, with a further three in the Champions League.   

It’s a far cry from his time at Chelsea, when he was so often wasteful.

This season, however, Jackson has outperformed Opta expectations by just over two goals, with Emery’s coaching methods perhaps having an impact…

“How he was working, how he was defending, how he was getting duels… wow. And then he has the power to attack with the spaces, to attack with duels. And his challenge is, when he can have chances to score, always in the corner of the goals, because he was shooting so much at the beginning the season like in rugby! So, he’s progressing well.” – Unai Emery on Nicolas Jackson’s Gameweek 8 display

Manzambi has also enjoyed an excellent start at Villa.

After he missed the first few matches of the season due to injury, he’s scored two goals in four starts and one substitute appearance.

The Switzerland international actually has the upper hand in minutes per shot, shot in the box and expected goal (xG), as shown in the table above.

However, Villa started the season incredibly slowly, with merely one goal in their first four matches, which has consequently impacted Jackson’s numbers. Indeed, the Senegal international managed only two shots and 0.24 xG in Gameweeks 2-4.

From Manzambi’s full debut in Gameweek 5 onwards, which has coincided with the Villans’ improved form, Jackson arguably has the better shot map, even if you’d like a few of those attempts to be more central.

Could that perhaps be by design, however, given Emery’s request to hit the corners, with Jackson simply trying to find the best angle to shoot?

Above: Nicolas Jackson (left) v Johan Manzambi’s (right) shot maps in Gameweeks 5-8

ASSIST POTENTIAL