Arsenal are set to face Aston Villa in the quarter-finals of the Conti Cup later this week and former Gunner Jordan Nobbs could line up against her former club for the first time.
The 30-year-old departed Arsenal after 12 years earlier this month to make the switch on a permanent basis to the Midlands club. Now, the two teams will face each other in the quarter-finals of the competition, with a place in the semi-finals up for grabs.
Jonas Eidevall's side enter the Conti Cup at this stage, due to their participation in the Women's Champions League. Thursday's opponents, on the other hand, finished top of their group, ahead of Manchester United, Durham, Everton and Sheffield United.
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The two sides have met once already this season in the Barclays Women's Super League, with the meeting at Villa Park in December ending in a comfortable 4-1 victory for the Gunners. Kirsty Hanson opened the scoring for Villa, before an own goal from Rachel Corsie and goals from Vivianne Miedema and Nobbs secured the victory.
Last time out, Villa secured a 1-1 draw against Manchester City at the academy stadium on Saturday, maintaining their unbeaten start to 2023. For Arsenal, their meeting away at Brighton was postponed on Sunday due to an unplayable pitch, so Eidevall's side come into the game having not played since the 1-1 draw against Chelsea earlier this month.
Arsenal will be hoping to progress to the semi-finals of the competition having missed out last season after the defeat to Manchester United in the quarter-finals. They last won the competition in 2018 and have secured the trophy five times in total.
The other quarter-final games taking place this week will see Liverpool welcome West Ham, Bristol City host Manchester City, and Chelsea are away at Tottenham in a London derby. Thursday's game between Arsenal and Villa is set to take place on Thursday evening at Meadow Park, but will be subject to a pitch inspection.
After a number of games across the pyramid were postponed over the weekend, Arsenal have confirmed a decision will be made at lunchtime on Thursday to determine whether the fixture can go ahead as planned. The club released in a statement on Tuesday: "We understand how disruptive postponements can be for supporters, particularly when they come close to kick-off time. In order to remove this risk entirely for our match on Thursday, we investigated the possibility of moving the match to Emirates Stadium, however this was not feasible due to essential pitch maintenance.
"We have agreed with The FA and Aston Villa that there will be a pitch inspection at Meadow Park at 12pm on Thursday ahead of kick-off at 7.45pm. A final decision on whether the match can be played will be made at this time and we will communicate the outcome of the inspection as soon as the decision is made by the match official.
"We hope this information provides some clarity for supporters of both teams and will minimise disruption in the event that a postponement is necessary."
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