Arsenal seek to pull clear of Man City
Arsenal have a golden chance to stretch their lead at the top of the Premier League this weekend with Manchester City distracted by the FA Cup as the scramble to avoid the drop intensifies.
A month ago Manchester City beat Arsenal 3-1 to go top of the Premier League table as Mikel Arteta’s men wobbled.
Now the Gunners can pull eight points clear of the defending champions if they beat out-of-sorts Crystal Palace at the Emirates tomorrow.
Palace have not won this year and have failed to even score in their past four games.
Arsenal have won all five league games since their defeat to City — their only loss at home this season — while their closest rivals dropped two precious points against Forest.
A 3-0 victory at Fulham last weekend was the 100th win of the Arteta era, which started in 2019.
It came in the Spaniard’s 168th game in charge, meaning his overall win percentage of 59.5 is the highest for any Arsenal manager in history.
Arteta has been deprived of the services of Eddie Nketiah, who is out of action with an ankle injury, but Gabriel Jesus returned to action last week following knee surgery to add more firepower.
January signing Leandro Trossard has also made a big impact in the final third — the Belgian provided all three assists at Fulham.
Arsenal crashed out of the Europa League after a penalty shoot-out loss to Sporting Lisbon at the Emirates Stadium on Thursday.
The last 16 second leg match ended level at 1-1 on the night and 3-3 on aggregate.
Sporting emerged with a shock 5-3 victory in the shoot-out as Gabriel Martinelli’s effort was saved by Antonio Adan and Nuno Santos dispatched the winning kick.
PALACE FIRE VIEIRA
Crystal Palace sacked manager Patrick Vieira yesterday after a miserable run of one win in 14 Premier League games pulled them into a relegation battle.
The London club, without a win in 2023 under the former Arsenal and France midfielder, are 12th in the table but are just three points above the drop zone.
“It is with enormous regret that this difficult decision has been made,” said chairman Steve Parish.
“Ultimately, results in recent months have placed us in a precarious league position and we felt a change is necessary to give us the best chance of retaining Premier League status.”
Palace said in a statement that “the process to appoint a new manager is under way”.
Vieira, 46, replaced Roy Hodgson before the start of the 2021/22 season and led Palace to a 12-placed finish.
But this season they have scored just 21 goals in 27 games — only three clubs have scored fewer.
Their 1-0 defeat by Brighton on Wednesday was their third loss in a row.