Manchester City beat Arsenal at the Etihad on Sunday, but what does it mean for the Opta supercomputer’s predictions for the Premier League title race?
Manchester City beat Arsenal in a huge game at the top of the Premier League on Sunday to keep the title race in their own hands with just a few games of the season remaining.
City took the lead after a quarter of an hour through a brilliant individual goal from Rayan Cherki, only for Arsenal to respond within two minutes when Kai Havertz charged down a Gianluigi Donnarumma clearance to equalise.
Erling Haaland then struck what turned out to be the winner midway through the second half as City continued their attempts to reel Arsenal in at the top of the league.
The result has been widely portrayed as next to terminal for Arsenal’s title chances, as City have all the momentum and Mikel Arteta’s side appear to be running out of steam.
However, the Opta supercomputer is rather more objective, and it doesn’t quite agree with that narrative. In its eyes, Arsenal remain the favourites to win the league, even if City’s chances have increased.
Before kick-off, Arsenal were huge favourites to win the title, doing so in 85.2% of the supercomputer’s latest round of 10,000 simulations of the rest of the season. City won the title in the remaining 14.8%.
But after Sunday’s result, rather than City moving into the driving seat, the supercomputer rates Arsenal’s chances of winning the title at 73.0%.
That might sound high, but let us explain.
Arsenal are still three points clear. City have a game in hand, but they have to win that. And they might have to win all of other remaining games, too. That’s no simple task in the Premier League.
And even if they do win those games, Arsenal could win all of theirs, which would mean the title race comes down to goal difference.
It’s not over. There’s plenty of time still to go and a whole lot of football still to be played. Both teams face games that look like potential banana skins.
What’s more, according to the objective measure that is the Opta Power Rankings, Arsenal have the easier remaining fixtures. There may be no “easy” games in the Premier League, and the home tie with Newcastle looks potentially problematic, but their last five games are all against sides currently in the bottom half of the Premier League.
City, meanwhile, have to play Everton, Bournemouth and Aston Villa, all of whom are still fighting to qualify for Europe next season.
If both teams win all of their games, Arsenal might have more chances to score the goals to boost their goal difference and take the title race away from City.
Of course, both teams have it in them to slip up in winnable games, so expect more twists and turns from here.
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