Steve Bruce ready to send Aston Villa on the attack as boss eyes Championship charge

A week billed as “huge” by the boss begins on Saturday evening when Villa host Midlands rivals Nottingham Forest.

Villa also face Burton and Bolton before the next international break and Bruce is eager to build on last week’s 3-0 win at Barnsley and further close the gap on division’s early pacesetters.

Victory at Oakwell was just his team’s second in the league, with the manager criticised by some supporters for what they perceive as negative tactics.

Yet Bruce insists a defence-first approach has been entirely by design, as he looked to halt the losing culture at Villa Park.

And he believes the return to fitness of star man Jonathan Kodjia, coupled with the loan signing of Robert Snodgrass and the emergence of young striker Keinan Davis, means Villa are now better placed to go on the offensive.

Bruce said: “I hear things levelled against me but I have always tried to play two up top in this division.

“I did it at Hull. A lot of people now play two up top and three at the back - that has become very fashionable. I did that six years ago to win promotion at Hull.

“I didn’t think here, as a club, we had it in ourselves, in my opinion. The statistics show that when I opened things up and tried to play that way, we got beat.

“I have always tried to play on the front foot but that is where my thinking has been. Now I have Kodjia, the emergence of young Keinan, Snodgrass, Ahmed Elmohamady.

“All the people I have tried to bring here are people to put us on the front foot. In that respect now the aim is to go and get a few results which will breed a bit of confidence and see us play in a certain way.”

Bruce became Villa’s fifth manager in the space of 20 months when he replaced Roberto Di Matteo last October.

He arrived with the club in the relegation zone before guiding them to a 13th placed finish.

An underwhelming start to this season has seen him come under pressure but the boss is now ready to loosen the shackles.

“We were in an awful place when I arrived, a team who had won five times in 18 months,” he said.

“Being difficult to beat, difficult to play against, organised on a defensive structure – that is the way I thought would take us forward, to try and stop the culture of getting beat. I’ll make no bones about that.

“I tried to open things up in January, too quickly. I bought people in – Henri Lansbury, Conor Hourihane and Scott Hogan – who had the top statistics in the division.

“It has taken them a little bit of time to adjust and settle into what Villa is.

“Now, where we are at this moment, we have a squad capable of mounting a challenge.”