Despite lacking “stardust” in attack, Arsenal remain the favourites to retain the Premier League title, according to former Liverpool and England defender Jamie Carragher.
The Sky Sports Monday Night Football pundit believes Manchester City are the only side capable of matching Mikel Arteta’s team, who moved to within three points of the leaders after a hard-fought 1-0 win at Nottingham Forest on Sunday.
Noni Madueke came off the bench to score the decisive goal in the 80th minute at the City Ground, preserving Arsenal’s position as the main challengers to City.
The result was Arsenal’s 32nd 1-0 Premier League victory since Arteta became manager in December 2019. That is the joint-highest total in the division during that period, alongside Everton.
City currently lead the table, with Enzo Maresca becoming the first manager in Premier League history to win his opening seven games in charge of a club. However, the Opta supercomputer gives Arsenal a 46.9% chance of finishing top, compared with 40.4% for City.
City’s title prospects could also be affected by any punishment resulting from the club being found guilty of breaching the Premier League’s financial rules. Carragher, though, considers Arsenal the team to beat even without taking those off-field matters into account.
“We’ve said before that Arsenal are not the most exciting champions we’ve ever seen,” Carragher said.
“They still lack stardust in the final third and didn’t get that superstar over the line that they wanted in the summer.”
He referred to reports linking Arsenal with Vinicius Junior and Julian Alvarez, saying the club had been unable to complete either deal.
“There was talk of Vinicius Junior coming in, obviously, and Julian Alvarez, but they didn’t get those deals done. They do lack star power in the final third and we saw more evidence of that on Sunday.”
Carragher also acknowledged criticism that Arteta’s emphasis on defensive control restricts Arsenal’s attacking play.
“Some people will also say Mikel Arteta has still got the reins on and is stopping them from showing their absolute best going forward, because they value the defence so much.”
However, he said Arsenal’s squad depth and first-choice team made them difficult to overcome.
“But they’ve got the best squad in the country and the best starting lineup. I don’t think anyone can go up against that really, except maybe Man City.”
Carragher added that Arsenal had faced similar doubts last season but remained strong because they had two high-quality players in every position, despite not possessing a game-changing attacker.
“I still see Arsenal as the team to stop,” he said. “If they dropped more points on Sunday, they could have been five behind Man City.”
Arsenal travel to Bayern Munich in the Champions League on Wednesday before hosting Everton at Emirates Stadium on Saturday. City’s next Premier League fixture is an away match against Aston Villa.
