Arsenal were supposed to feast on bottom club Wolves and open up a daunting seven-point lead over Manchester City at the top of the Premier League table.
At the risk of over-extending the metaphor, they ended up playing with their food before falling over on the way out and landing headfirst in the dessert trolley.
No Premier League leaders in history have failed to beat a team in the relegation zone having taken a two-goal lead. Wolves are so in the relegation zone they’re almost underneath it. Tonight’s point was just their 10th of the season, and they remain 17 points from safety having won just a single game all year.
And yet, the sturdiest defence in English football — the bedrock of the team that won eight of eight in the league phase of the UEFA Champions League — could not hold out against Rob Edwards’ rag-tag bunch, with Riccardo Calafiori’s unfortunate own goal staining a needlessly chaotic finale.
So, is this just a troubling blip or evidence that Arsenal are going to do that thing they are so mockingly and spitefully accused of doing in every British football fan’s favourite slang term. With a north London derby against Tottenham looming on Sunday, are the Gunners going to bottle the title?
Premier League title race: State of play after Wolves vs. Arsenal
After the game at Molineux, Arsenal held a five-point lead over Manchester City having played a game more, still a very handy position.
Very likely the picture will have shifted a fair amount before City play their game in hand against Crystal Palace, which does not yet have a date. It is slated for the week commencing March 16.
City and Arsenal were supposed to play Palace and Wolves on the weekend of March 22/23, but that is when they will play each other in the Carabao Cup final. The City vs. Palace match could not be rearranged for this midweek, like Wolves vs. Arsenal, because last season’s FA Cup winners have a UEFA Conference League playoff clash with Zrinjski Mostar on Thursday, February 19.
Aston Villa are third and eight points behind Arsenal, and also now have a game in hand. However, like City and the Gunners, Unai Emery’s side have suffered a slump in form since the turn of the year. In that respect, it is beginning to feel like a title that no one wants to win, but the absence of a team that looks capable of a season-breaking run means Arsenal’s points on the board still carry notable weight.
Increasingly, it seems as if the match between City and Arsenal at the Etihad Stadium on the weekend of April 18/19 will be absolutely pivotal.
Why are Arsenal struggling in the Premier League
Holding onto leads
Arsenal are still the best team in the Premier League when it comes to retaining points from winning positions.
In the 21 games where they have taken the lead, they have won 17 of them. City with 16 wins from the 21 times they have scored first are their closest rivals in this regard.
The problem is that three of the times Arsenal have dropped points from winning positions have come in their past five Premier League matches — the 3-2 defeat to Manchester United and the draws at Brentford and Wolves.
This comes at a time when City have won back-to-back matches, including a dramatic win over Liverpool at Anfield, following their own dip of one win in six Premier League games.
The galling thing for Arsenal is they have 10 points from the past 21 on offer, when they could have pulled into an effectively unassailable lead. Instead, they have left City alive.
Leaving games up for grabs
The wider lack of clinical finishing outlined above can also be felt within game, and the second-half drift at Wolves may come back to haunt Mikel Arteta’s side.
Arsenal can put teams away, as evidenced by their imposing 4-0 win away to in-form Leeds United at the end of February. A week later, Sunderland shipped a 3-0 defeat at Emirates Stadium.
It’s unrealistic to expect a title-winning team to blow teams away every week and narrow wins are often the building blocks of title winning campaign in the world’s toughest league. But there has been a lingering sense Arsenal leave too many games on the table.
There have been eight one-goal and three two-goal victories this season. Those fine margins caught up with them against Brentford and Wolves.
Form and fitness woes up front
Part of the reason Arsenal games remain up for grabs is their lack of a reliable goalscorer up front.
If you’d told people at the start of the season that Arsenal would be top of the table in mid-February with Viktor Gyokeres as their top Premier League goalscoroer, you’d have wagered on the formerly prolific Sporting CP star having more than eight goals.
Gabriel Jesus and Kai Havertz have only just returned to action and the latter is injured again. Bukayo Saka has had his own fitness problems but was preferred at No. 10 to Eberechi Eze at Wolves. England international Eze scored three of his four Premier League goal this season in a derby day hat-trick against Tottenham that has quickly come to feel like a distant memory.
Mikel Arteta reaction to Wolves 2-2 Arsenal
It’s very tough to accept it [the result] but the second half we didn’t perform to any level in any aspect of the game at the standards that are required to win a game in the Premier League, and we paid the price
Too many things that went wrong was one after another, basically. We didn’t have any dominance or control at the end of the game, unfortunately.
When you don’t perform and are at this level with the expectations are where they are, you have to take the hit because you deserve it.
It’s very easy now with the emotions to say things that damage the team, and that is the worst decision that you can make, because everybody wants to do their best, nobody questions that, at the level and standard that is required.”
“The enjoyment comes from moments of suffering as well. If you believe that you come to any ground in the Premier League and you don’t have to go through tough periods, that’s not the reality so the enjoyment comes as well from those moments when you’re not at your best. Okay, get through and find out a way to come through that, and today in the last minute we paid the price.
Arsenal fixture schedule: Next five games
- Tottenham vs. Arsenal | Premier League | Sunday, February 22
- Arsenal vs. Chelsea | Premier League | Sunday, March 1
- Brighton vs. Arsenal | Premier League | Wednesday, March 4
- Mansfield vs. Arsenal | FA Cup 5th Round | Saturday, March 7
- Arsenal vs. Everton | Premier League | Saturday, March 15
