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By Tony Attwood
So we’ve just had a couple of games (including the one with the under 21s) and we are off again, and this time there’s a novelty – no TV coverage. But there it is, on the fixture list: Burnley v Arsenal, Saturday 3pm, so that must be right.
The home and away chart does give the advantage to Arsenal, but not by that much. For Burnley have scored more goals at home than Arsenal away. which is something of a shock.
| Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13 | Burnley home | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 7 |
| 2 | Arsenal away | 4 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 9 |
But we can take a bit of encouragement from the last six games table, where Arsenal’s superiority shines through.
| Pos | Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Arsenal | 6 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 10 | 2 | +8 | 16 |
| 14 | Burnley | 6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 8 | 11 | -3 | 7 |
Burnley started off the season ok, with two wins and a draw, including a couple of home wins against Sunderland and Derby, although they let themselves and us down in the opening game with a 3-0 defeat to Tottenham.
But then they decided to take part in proving our dip theory, by having a dip lasting no less than six games, which took them through five defeats and a draw (the latter being against the not very mighty Nottingham Fo). They managed six goals in that run but conceded 13.
| Date | Game | Res | Score | Competition |
| 30 Aug 2025 | Manchester United v Burnley | L | 3-2 | Premier League |
| 14 Sep 2025 | Burnley v Liverpool | L | 0-1 | Premier League |
| 20 Sep 2025 | Burnley v Nottingham Forest | D | 1-1 | Premier League |
| 23 Sep 2025 | Burnley v Cardiff City | L | 1-2 | League Cup |
| 27 Sep 2025 | Manchester City v Burnley | L | 5-1 | Premier League |
| 5 Oct 2025 | Aston Villa v Burnley | L | 2-1 | Premier League |
The last two games have been wins against Leeds (15th at present) and Wolverhampton Wands, who are currently bottom of the league.
Burnley were, of course, promoted last season from the Championship and in achieving that, they were unbeaten at home (14 wins and nine draws), so only winning half of their four home games must have come as a bit of a shock. And thus overall, although the home v away table at the top suggests this might be an even match, other factors disagree.
As you might expect, across the years, Arsenal have had the better of things between the two clubs. There have been 115 games between the two, with 49% won by Arsenal, 21% being draws, and 30% being won by Burnley, which reflects the dominance we might well anticipate.
Curiously it has not always been like this as it took Arsenal six atetmpts to get their fifrst win, and there have been some difficult times subsequently, with only one win in nine games between the two for Arsenal in the years 1921 to 1924 – but these of course were the years of Leslie Knighton in control, the man who complained that he was sacked by Norris to make way for Chapman, and later invented the insane tale that Norris apologised and said sacking his was the worst decision of his life. And this of the man who took Arsenal within inches of Division Two.
But enough of the olden days. Between 2009 and 2024, these clubs have played each other no less than 20 times, 18 in the League and two in the FA Cup. Of these, Burnley have won once on 13 December 2020 at the Arsenal stadium. It was 1-0.
This was in the midst of a terrible run for Arsenal in which Arsenal played seven league games, lost five and drew two. In fact, Arsenal were losing to everyone at this time, including the likes of Everton and Wolverhampton. But of course, as the 2009 to 2024 figures above show, these are now different days.
The one thing that could hinder Arsenal would be the injury table, which shows Jesus, Madueke, Havertz and Odegaard definitely out, and Saliba and Martinelli only ranked with a 25% chance of playing.
Burnley have Amdouni, Roberts and Beyer definitely out. But in the last game between the club, in February last year, we did win 0-5, and I think I might have a video of that for the next article.
We can expect Burnley to operate a “low-block”, which seems to be an updated term for parking the bus and rely on occasional breakaway attacks. My impressions are that they can use these tactics to good effect. We should not underestimate them.