It’s that time of the year again when the dreaded trip to Old Trafford comes around, writes Ian Taylor.

The last time we won at Manchester United I was still at school! But I’ve got a funny feeling this could finally be Villa’s year.

There’s been a lot of talk of about the injury crisis at Manchester United and I think they did remarkably well to beat Wolfsburg in midweek, considering the back four included three midfielders in Park Ji-Sung, Michael Carrick and Darren Fletcher.

There are not many teams who could still dig out such a result with such a list of absentees.

But I’m expecting a far stronger team to face Villa this weekend – Wayne Rooney, Nemanja Vidic, Ryan Giggs and Dimitar Berbatov are all likely to come in and they are four key players.

However, I still think Villa have a fantastic chance. They’re in really good form at the moment.

The return to action of Stewart Downing seems to have given them a timely lift going into the vital Christmas period and there seems to be plenty of goals in the team.

James Milner has proved to be a revelation in the centre of midfield so far but, with respect to Portsmouth and Hull, the likes of Anderson and Paul Scholes will represent an altogether different test.

I went up to Old Trafford for the game there last season and we were desperately unlucky to leave with nothing, let alone three points.

John Carew was an absolute handful that day and I’d like to see him start ahead of Emile Heskey this weekend because I think he’s a bigger goal threat.

Our away form has been patchy so far this season but I still think our game is better suited to playing away from home.

It’s amazing what a difference confidence makes in a dressing room and luckily Villa’s will be full of it after their recent run.

Having already won at Liverpool and beaten Chelsea, they will believe they can pull off a shock.

I’ve said before that United aren’t the side they were last season and with their injury plight I don’t think Villa will have a better chance of ending this dismal record.

You only had to watch the way Cristiano Ronaldo starred for Real Madrid in midweek to see what they are missing now.

Rooney is the key for United now.

And if O’Neill’s men can stop him firing they have a real chance because after that I don’t think there’s that much between the two sides.