Head to Head - Cesc Fabregas v Steven Davis

Arsenal v Aston Villa

Barclays Premiership

Emirates Stadium

Sat, Aug 19, 2006, 3pm

Two of the brightest young midfield talents in the Premiership Soccer go head to head when Emirates Stadium hosts its inaugural Premiership encounter on Saturday.

Cesc Fabregas, 19, lit up this summer’s World Cup with a series of mature displays for Spain and began the new campaign in style last week, scoring twice as Arsenal Football Club beat Dinamo Zagreb 3-0 in their Champions League qualifier.

Aston Villa’s Steven Davis, meanwhile, has declared himself fit for what will be Martin O’Neill’s first competitive game in charge of Villa.

Both players made 35 league appearances for their clubs last season although the Villa man clocked up over 300 more minutes than his Arsenal counterpart. Despite the shortfall in playing time, Fabregas [5] created four more goals for his team-mates than Davis [1].

But the 21-year-old Davis did manage one more goal - contributing a quartet of strikes to the Villa cause.

The end-of-season statistics for the 2005/06 campaign also indicate that Davis was marginally the better tackler last season, achieving a success rate of 67 per cent compared with the Spaniard’s 65 per cent.

But Fabregas leaves Davis in his wake in most other departments according to the stats. The Spaniard had a shot accuracy of 71 per cent compared to Davis’ 52 per cent and made more passes, [207] in less time, with a higher success rate [54] than the Villa man [196 and 51 per cent respectively].

Fabregas also comes out on top in the dribbling stakes with a success rate of 49 per cent compared to Davis’ 38 per cent. The Arsenal teenager did however pick up five bookings in the league last term while Davis avoided seeing yellow all campaign long.

[Source from; www.arsenal.com]