Steven Gerrard will be without four of his Aston Villa players for the trip to Leicester City, The Athletic's Gregg Evans reports

Lucas Digne, Bertrand Traore, Kortney Hause and Morgan Sanson have all been ruled out of the clash with the Foxes.

The lowdown

Villa travel to The King Power Stadium looking to end a run of four consecutive Premier League defeats that has seen them slip to 15th place in the table.

Gerrard's predecessor Dean Smith was actually sacked by Villa after a sequence of five straight losses in the autumn.

They didn't play last weekend after their clash with Liverpool was postponed because of the Reds' FA Cup semifinal commitments. Gerrard will hope that the extended break has benefitted his squad.

Their hosts are six places above them in the table, but might just have one eye on their Europa Conference League semifinal clash with AS Roma on Thursday night.

[web_stories_embed url="https://www.footballtransfertavern.com/web-stories/aston-villa-latest-developments/" title="Aston Villa latest developments!" poster="" width="360" height="600" align="none"]

The latest

Evans tweeted on Friday morning that Traore would miss the match with a groin injury, with Kortney Hause and Morgan Sanson also 'unavailable' and 'out of the trip to LCFC'.

The journalist added that Digne has 'an outside chance' of returning for the 'final games of the season' after breaking his collarbone last time out against Tottenham Hotspur.

The verdict

Immediately after the meeting with Spurs, Gerrard expressed his fear that Digne would be out for the rest of the season.

From that point of view, it's perhaps a positive that he could still play a part for the Villans in the coming weeks.

As for the other absentees, Hause hasn't made the matchday squad since the clash with Southampton at the start of March and hasn't played a Premier League minute since 22 January.

But Traore has provided Gerrard with an option off the bench, having most recently played the last 20 minutes of the narrow defeat against Arsenal.

Sanson's absence is an even bigger blow given that he started against Wolves earlier this month.

And with the depth of his squad reduced by injury, it will be even more difficult for Gerrard to stop the rot.

In other news, West Ham are keen to sign this Villa star.