Arsenal and Man City run-ins: Analysing the EPL title challengers’ fixtures

As title tussles go, few have felt so delicately poised.

Since the two front-runners met for the first time in the Premier League this season in February, second-placed Manchester City have won five of their six league games and leaders Arsenal seven out of their eight, with City drawing away to Nottingham Forest three days on from that victory at the Emirates Stadium and Arsenal doing the same at Liverpool last weekend to leave the gap at six points.

With Arsenal visiting the Etihad Stadium in 12 days' time and City having a game in hand, the pendulum feels like it has swung in the favour of Pep Guardiola's defending champions as they try to win the trophy for a third year running.

FiveThirtyEight's fluctuating forecasted league table captures the tension.

Predicting the outcome of each of the season's remaining fixtures, based on the strength of the respective teams, its model ran simulations to play out the run-in 20,000 times to calculate an overall predicted final league table.

Those two dropped points for Mikel Arteta's men on Sunday at Anfield — their first domestic blip in almost two months since the 3-1 home loss to City — meant they dropped to second in the forecasted standings, with a swing of 11 per cent from last weekend's projections proving that each mistake in this supremely tight race is quickly becoming costlier than the last.

Crucially, we can cross reference FiveThirtyEight's forecasting against OPTA/Stats Perform's predicted final league table.

This is similarly established by calculating a figure for the attacking and defensive strength of each team, based on their results in previous seasons, with more weighting given to the more recent results. From those weights, multiple simulations are run for the remaining fixtures for each club. What the grid below displays is the average of the results across these 100,000 simulations.

While these predictions don't account for player injuries, suspensions, VAR errors or fluctuations in form, it is a useful, non-biased yardstick for how things might play out.

Opta has City as the favourites now too — although its margin of probability is tighter than the FiveThirtyEight one.

We've decided to assess the two teams' remaining Premier League matches in detail, analysing the strengths of the clubs they are still to play, and where the title could be won and lost…

Manchester City

Current position: Second

Predicted final position: First

Even six points off the pace — albeit with a game in hand and a head-to-head meeting with Arsenal at home to come — City's relentless recent form has seen them shoot to the top of the projected league.

Tuesday's 3-0 win over visitors Bayern Munich in the first leg of a Champions League quarter-final was a further statement of intent, going into what has historically been their manager Pep Guardiola's favourite part of the season.

City have scored 35 goals and conceded just four in 10 matches across all competitions since that surprising draw in Nottingham on February 18, ahead of a run-in that FiveThirtyEight's algorithm ranks as the fifth easiest of all Premier League clubs.

Sandwiched between commitments at the sharp ends of the Champions League and FA Cup, the visit of struggling Leicester this weekend looks to be a concentration tester as City try to keep the three plates spinning.

Then there's the game at home to Arsenal a week on Wednesday, which has the potential to be season-defining. Following that is a run of three games against currently out-of-form sides (Fulham away, West Ham and Leeds, both at home) which could give City the chance to ramp up the pressure before a trickier end to the campaign.

Should City see out their first-leg advantage over Bayern on Wednesday, their prospective two-legged Champions League semi-final (probably against holders Real Madrid, who lead Chelsea 2-0 from the home leg of their quarter-final) will fall either side of a trip to relegation candidates Everton, while their postponed fixture away to Brighton is likely to be slotted into the schedule between Chelsea and Brentford during a challenging final week.

These fixtures might not look that tough on paper but it's far from an easy finish for Guardiola's winning machine.

Amid a gruelling fixture pile-up, tactical innovation could be the key to keeping City fresh.

Few could have foreseen the sudden emergence of John Stones as a midfield metronome in the build-up phase, but we're yet to see a team find an answer to City's intriguing variation of their 3-4-3 on the ball.

Even by his own admission, Stones is keeping things simple in the middle of the park. Yet, his constant movement alongside Rodri, always looking to receive the ball and keep passing sequences ticking over, allows advanced midfielders such as Kevin De Bruyne and Ilkay Gundogan to operate in the dangerous half-spaces, as a box-shaped midfield four emerges.

Much like Arsenal, who achieve a similar shape with full-back Oleksandr Zinchenko tucking inside, City can now load five attackers across the opposition's back four, with each player able to attack the gaps on the outside of and in between the members of the defensive line.

With a passing accuracy of 92 per cent across his four games in this hybrid role, Stones' calmness on the ball allows City to sustain their constant squeeze. Against Liverpool two weeks ago, they were able to record their highest field tilt (77.3 per cent) in matches between the two clubs since Guardiola's arrival in the summer of 2016, illustrating their ability to pen opponents in.

Stones' calmness in the middle helps City sustain the kind of unrelenting pressure that allows them to grind out such monstrous winning streaks.

Arsenal

Current position: First

Predicted final position: Second

For the league leaders, Sunday's draw with Liverpool, having led 2-0, was a brutal introduction to what life is like in a title race with Manchester City.

Drop any points — particularly in April and May — and Guardiola's boys in blue will be on your case.

Even so, that stumble at Anfield certainly isn't the complete capitulation the fallout from it might lead you to believe. They had won seven on the bounce in the league before that draw, after all.

With that Mohamed Salah penalty miss and Aaron Ramsdale's wonder saves, Mikel Arteta's side hung on for a point against Liverpool — and had a chance to snatch all three points at the end. Gabriel Martinelli's misplaced pass in the game's final moments might well have been City's sucker punch, but Arsenal have shown great resilience so far and many expect them to take the champions all the way.

Their remaining fixtures start with successive games against relegation candidates West Ham and Southampton — complicated but winnable. Provided there are no hiccups before they get to the Etihad, Arsenal can wrestle back control by avoiding defeat that night in Manchester.

Easier said than done obviously but, while City have to win, they can make do with a draw.

Arsenal's path to glory then takes an admittedly tricky turn. FiveThirtyEight gives them a 52 per cent, 36 per cent and 49 per cent chance of beating Chelsea, Newcastle and Brighton respectively in the next three games.

They finish the season with a trip to Forest and a final-day home game with Wolves, two more of the sides currently sweating on relegation. Arteta will be targeting six points from those two while City face a tough final week against Chelsea and Brentford (and possibly that rearranged fixture with Brighton, too).

Yes, the pressure has been piled on, but panic is the last thing Arsenal can afford to do.

Perhaps the most pleasing aspect of Arsenal's recent run has been the seamless (re)integration of crucial attacking options, with the fit-again Gabriel Jesus slotting in alongside winter-window signing Leandro Trossard without any major hitches.

It's early for Jesus as he has only played 178 Premier League minutes in four appearances since returning from post-World Cup knee surgery, but his three goals in that time have showcased a distinct sharpness. He even won his own penalty against Leeds with elusive, tip-tapping footwork before dispatching it with his usual unerring confidence.

Even more encouraging has been Trossard, whose seven assists are the most of any Premier League player since he made his Arsenal debut (Bryan Mbeumo of Brentford is next with four).

Across his 555 minutes of league action for Arsenal, only De Bruyne is averaging more expected assists (xA) per 90 minutes than Trossard, while 5.5 crosses per game from the left third help to underline his creative presence in wide areas, tending to lurk the furthest left of Arteta's forward five during build-up play.

Also adept at drifting into the half-space and driving to the byline, the Belgium international offers variety and versatility across the front three.

For a group of players under such psychological pressure, fresh solutions and original skill sets from the bench will be key to keeping Arsenal inspired.

So, while the data sides with City, this title race remains one of the toughest to predict in recent memory.

Pitting the two run-ins side by side, grading the fixture difficulty using FiveThirtyEight's calculations, we can see that Guardiola's side could have a slight advantage heading into the home straight.

For now, though, it's West Ham and Leicester for our two wannabe champions this weekend.

Let the fun begin.