Manchester City’s chances of winning the Premier League title hardly improve after Liverpool’s victory, as Arsenal’s match schedule favors Mikel Arteta’s success.
Mikel Arteta has been given some much-needed perspective after his Arsenal team saw Manchester City claim a shock victory at Anfield.(Image: Robbie Jay Barratt – AMA/Getty Images)
You might have thought that Manchester City’s victory over Liverpool at Anfield would have boosted their title hopes to a new level. Especially if you were subject to Gary Neville’s whaling, almost pining to keep the Premier League title race alive.
The persistent “three-point gap” screams that, for the moment, it remains six until Manchester City host Fulham and the Gunners go to Brentford, which is enough to make anyone of the Arsenal persuasion reach for the volume down button on their remote control.
The reality was, of course, that the gap between Arsenal and Manchester City remained exactly the same as before the ball was kicked. Of course, it could have been extended to nine had it not been for City’s second win at Anfield in the league since 2003, but as Mikel Arteta would say, he just needs to focus on his team as they fight to end a 22-year wait for the title.
Interestingly, according to the Opta supercomputer, after Arsenal’s victory over Sunderland, but before the match began at Anfield, the Gunners had a 93.64% chance of winning the title, while City had just 4.55%. So, you would think that after the surprising victory over Arne Slot’s team, those numbers would have changed considerably, right?
Badly, after City’s improbable victory, City’s chances had increased to just 8.15%, an increase of just 3.6%. While Arsenal’s hopes fell to a value of 90.14%. The supercomputer takes many metrics into account when making these assessments, including the Gunners’ results so far and the points-per-game values of each side’s remaining opponents.
Arsenal travel to Brentford on Thursday in the first of three straight away games in the league. Next week’s visit to Wolves is one of the three most trips away from London in the Premier League despite it being only February.
Arsenal have already played eight of the top ten teams away from home with only the Bees and Manchester City yet to play. They have played teams currently in third place (Aston Villa), fourth (Manchester United), sixth (Liverpool) and ninth (Sunderland) home and away and don’t need to face any of them.
Man City, on the other hand, still have to play Chelsea (A) Everton (A) Brentford (H) Bournemouth (A) Aston Villa (H) and, of course, host Arsenal at the Etihad Stadium. This is probably the biggest indicator yet of why City’s title hopes barely budged after their win at Anfield.