Both of these teams were promotion favourites and they would have been keen to avoid each other in the playoffs, however, a stoppage-time goal from Patrick Bamford set up this tie and they would both be looking to get ahead of each other and book a place in the Playoff finals.
There has been huge transfers between this sides in recent season and this game could be what decides which club got the better of the Albert Adomah-Adama Traore swap deal in 2016. while Adomah has netted 14 times this season, he seems to be out of form heading into this match, meanwhile, Adama Traore is beginning to show signs that he has become mature by producing results from his unpredictability.
Boro are the form team ahead of this game as they collected 10 points from their final ten games to push themselves into a relegation Playoff place, while Aston Villa have struggled of late and their bad form was partly the reason why they missed out on automatic promotion.
Villa have scored more than a goal in only one of their last 6 games, with many of their star men struggling form, they could suffer a heavy defeat in this first leg.
Villa have won on 4 occasions in their last five visits to Boro.
