By Bulldog Drummond
Manchester City are the best home team in the country, and Arsenal are the best away team in the country, but even without taking into account recent results Manchester City are out-doing Arsenal this season when these two statistics are compared. Manchester City at home have got more points, scored more goals and played fewer games than Arsenal have played and achieved away.
| Pos | Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Manchester City | 15 | 13 | 1 | 1 | 50 | 15 | 35 | 40 |
| 1 | Arsenal | 16 | 11 | 3 | 2 | 32 | 13 | 19 | 36 |
And the situation looks even less hopeful if we consider the last six home games for Manchester City and last six away games for Arsenal.
| Pos | Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Man City home | 6 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 19 | 5 | 14 | 18 |
| 2 | Arsenal away | 6 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 12 | 7 | 5 | 11 |
Going back to the last ten games we find something a little closer – more goals for Arsenal, goal difference identical, just one point apart.
| Pos | Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Manchester City | 10 | 8 | 1 | 1 | 25 | 8 | 17 | 25 |
| 2 | Arsenal | 10 | 7 | 3 | 0 | 30 | 13 | 17 | 24 |
Of course we know that our problems are in defence, not in attack, as this table based on top scoring clubs in the last six games shows…
| Pos | Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Manchester City | 6 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 18 | 4 | 14 | 18 |
| 4 | Arsenal | 6 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 18 | 9 | 9 | 12 |
| 3 | Newcastle United | 6 | 5 | 0 | 1 | 17 | 7 | 10 | 15 |
| 2 | Aston Villa | 6 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 13 | 2 | 11 | 16 |
Arsenal have of course still won many more games against Manchester City than the reverse, because no matter what else is true, before the advent of Sheikh Mansour, Manchester C didn’t have much luck against Arsenal. But since then… well, Arsenal beat Manchester City 2-1 on 21 December 2015, in the Premier League, and since then in League games Arsenal have had 12 defeats and two draws. And those draws were back in 2016 and 2017.
So this is just about the worst run of results against a Premier League club I have ever seen for Arsenal. Of this dozen games that Arsenal have lost only four have been by the single goal. Four have been by two goals, three by three goals, and one by five goals.
The last time Manchester City lost a game was in fact a 1-0 defeat at White Hart Lane in the Unnamed Stadium, on 5 February this year. One can only imagine what oddities happened in that match.
As for our injured men Tomiyasu is out for the rest of the season having now had surgery, Granit Xhaka is “still a doubt,” Elneny is of course out for the season and Saliba’s report reads ‘No real improvement, we are still waiting, still hopeful, but another week [has] gone by, and he was not able to train with the team.’
So even on the injury front Manchester City have the advantage as their only injury is Nathan Ake who is still ruled out. Otherwise, they have no problems – except a looming legal case with over 100 charges against them, but I suspect that is just motiving them even more.
Part of the problem for Arsenal is that across the past five seasons, Mancheseter City have gathered in between 81 points and 100 points as they have won the league four times out of five.
If the two clubs at the top keep on with the same form that has seen them through the season they will reap the same number of points. But if they also keep scoring and conceding at the current rate Manchester City will win on goal difference.
GD-38 gives the estimated goal difference at the end of the season based on results so far. Likewise, Pts-38 is the total number of points at the end of the season based on results so far.
| Team | P | F | A | GD | Pts | GD – 38 | Pts- 38 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Arsenal | 32 | 77 | 34 | 43 | 75 | 51 | 89 |
| 2 | Manchester City | 30 | 78 | 28 | 50 | 70 | 63 | 89 |
Barring the somewhat unlikely event of Brighton and Hove winning all their remaining games and Arsenal losing all of theirs and other results going against them, Arsenal will be back in the Champions League next season however. They will be in pot 1 if they win the Premier League but otherwise in one of pots two, three or four probably as the second-seeded team. However the lack of Europe this season, although helping with the rebuilding of the League team without the distraction of mid-week games, will have knocked the co-efficient back a bit.
