Sheffield Wednesday are ready to head into battle once again in the Championship and Carlos Carvalhal is happy with his players and the preparation work ahead of the Villa clash.
Having come so close to promotion last term, the head coach is aware that expectations are raised for the new term.
But for Carlos, the key thing is to keep building, keep improving the team and focus on each challenge step by step.
Aston Villa represent a tough test to begin the new term but the head coach says his side head into the game with good expectations and one big weapon in their armoury – the supporters.
He said: “We are still in the process and still improving the team, last season we finished in sixth.
“Brighton finished with 15 points more than us, Derby finished ahead of us and they are still improving their teams, they have good teams.
“We must understand in this competition, there are five or six teams that have changed their coach, some of them their chairman, they are improving their teams and we never know if they can come from the back with better conditions.
“But what I will tell you is that we are ready to go step by step, game by game and we understand that in this competition we are a strong side and can win to all our opponents, absolutely sure.
“I am very happy with the players that we have, I think we are doing very well, the chairman, the staff, the players, the fans - the fans are unbelievable. They can make a big difference.
“They can make a massive difference in the competition and these kind of things can give us more energy to go more steps ahead.
“Aston Villa have a very good team for sure but one thing they won’t have on Sunday is over 28,000 fans at Hillsborough giving support.”
As underlined on countless occasions during the 2015/16 campaign, the Hillsborough support is a crucial factor for the club.
Wednesday slipped to only two defeats on home soil last season with the supporters contributing massively to that strong home record.
Expecting more of the same from Wednesdayites this weekend, Carlos added: “We are with good expectations for the season, we did a good pre-season, we are with a good dynamic and ready to start.
“Our massive fans will do a fantastic support to our team. I remember with the games against Cardiff and Brighton, we gave a challenge to them.
“They remember how the players answered them back, the players’ confidence was very high and saw would could happen. We will need that again.”