Aston Villa hot-shot Ollie Watkins looking to break 20-goal barrier

Ambitious Ollie Watkins has set sights on hitting the 20-goal mark and firing into Villa into Europe.

The in-form striker will tonight aim to score for the sixth successive away match, having on Saturday become the club’s first to ever score in five straight Premier League away fixtures.

Watkins’ strike in the 2-0 win over Chelsea took his total tally for the season to 11, including seven in his last nine appearances.

And the 27-year-old is hungry to continue his streak with Villa’s chances of qualifying for Europe becoming more real with every passing week.

“I’m still not content with where I am at, I want more,” he said. “We’ve got a real understanding as a team now. The fans should be excited because we definitely are.

“There’s a confidence that we can see games out now whereas at the start of the season we might have conceded. I want to score 20 goals and I want to get into Europe. I want to be playing every Thursday next season.”

Villa, who have taken 29 points from 15 matches under Unai Emery and lost only once away from home, will be favourites to continue their climb up the table against a Leicester team winless in six Premier League matches and now managerless, with Mike Stowell and Adam Sadler taking charge tonight following Brendan Rodgers’ departure.

But Watkins and his team-mates will be all too aware the Foxes were winless in five league matches when they arrived at Villa Park in early February and escaped with a 4-2 win.

Matty Cash (calf) and Philippe Coutinho (hamstring) remain out with Emery expected to keep faith with the XI which started at Stamford Bridge.