Aston Villa v Burnley: Unai Emery's men eye fourth straight win as keeper makes 'faith' claim amid tough start

It was only seven days ago that Villa's early season form was under the spotlight - after a difficult run of results that was arguably the toughest period of Emery's time at Villa Park.

Three defeats  and three draws from their first six games in all competitions was not what many had predicted.

And heading into their Europa League clash with Bologna last week - Villa just needed a victory.

They managed to get over the line with some late heroics from goalkeeper Marco Bizot - and it proved to be a result that could well have been a turning point to Villa's early season struggles.

They followed it up with their first Premier League win of the season against Fulham on Sunday - and further backed that up with an impressive victory over Feyenoord in the Europa League on Thursday night.

Now, after that rocky run of results, Villa have a bit of momentum heading into this week's home clash with Burnley - as they look to make it four wins on the spin.

Despite the talk around their early season form - goalkeeper Bizot, who came into the side on Thursday evening following a late injury to Emi Martinez, insists the players still 'kept the faith', despite a surprising start.

He said: "It has been a difficult beginning of the season - but we never lost the faith or hope.

"We still got spirit even when it was not like, great in the beginning of the season.

"But now hopefully we have this fight and we can keep up with it.

"We are playing better, we are more solid and have more confidence. 

"And we are scoring goals and that is the most important thing."

A key difference of Villa's turnaround in the last week has been the ability to find the net.

In their first four Premier League games they failed to register a single goal - and only scored one in the first five which came courtesy of Matty Cash at Sunderland.

Now they head into the weekend's clash against the newly promoted Clarets having scored six times in their last three outings.

It looks like Bizot, who produced another impressive display on Thursday evening, may well get the nod back on home soil on Sunday, with Martinez pulling up in the warm up against Feyenoord with a calf injury.

Elsewhere, Villa could still be without a number of key players who missed Thursday night's game.

Youri Tielemans has been sidelined for the past two and a half weeks with a calf injury - while Amadou Onana has not featured since the defeat at Brentford.

Jaden Sancho could make a return having missed the European clash. He trained at Bodymoor Heath before the game, but did not travel having not fully recovered from an illness that ruled him out of the Fulham game.