Manchester City vs Arsenal

Manchester City and out-of-form Arsenal go head-to-head at the Etihad Stadium in a mouth-watering Premier League showdown.

Manchester City launched a proper response to their opening day loss at Tottenham Hotspur by putting newly-promoted Norwich City to the sword last time out. The ‘Cityzens’ have now recorded back-to-back 5-0 home Premier League triumphs. Despite alternating victories and defeats across their last seven Premier League outings, Pep Guardiola’s side will be confident of establishing some consistency against a side they’ve shut out in four consecutive top-flight H2Hs (W4). By extension, Man City have kept six clean sheets in their last seven league matches against Arsenal, home and away (W7). Moreover, since a 2-2 draw at the Etihad in May 2016, the hosts have racked up five straight home league victories over this opposition by an aggregate scoreline of 12-3. Interestingly, they opened the scoring four times across that five-game sequence, which was the case in 16 of their 19 home Premier League outings last season.

Under-fire manager Mikel Arteta will hope Arsenal’s 6-0 thrashing of West Brom in the Carabao Cup midweek could be a turning point as his underperforming side face one of the toughest tests in English football. The ‘Gunners’ have opened their Premier League campaign with consecutive 2-0 defeats to fellow London rivals Brentford and Chelsea as they stare at the prospect of losing each of their first three top-flight matches for the first time since 1954/55. Backed by the return of star duo Alexandre Lacazette and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang following a severe Covid-19 crisis, will boost Arsenal’s hopes of hampering a run of six consecutive reverses to reigning Premier League champions. Alarmingly, the Londoners have conceded precisely three goals in each of their last five such encounters. Additionally, they’ve gone winless in 16 of their previous 17 away games to defending champions (D6, L10).