Key events
51 min Rodri drives a terrific long pass to put Semenyo through on goal, but he can’t control the dropping ball on the volley and it runs through to Raya. That was a chance.
49 min There were a lot of players between Haaland and the goal, so that chance was probably tougher than it looked. Even so, for a player of his class, etc.
48 min: Haaland hits the post!
Cherki slides a pass down the side to Semenyo, whose cross deflects behind off Gabriel. Bernardo Silva’s inswinging corner is pushed away awkwardly by the under-pressure Raya. Khusanov’s shot is blocked and then Haaland, at a tightish angle, slaps the ball off the outside of his feet.
47 min “Kai Havertz came to the Premier League almost six years ago,” writes Matt Dony. “So I have spent over half a decade trying to form a satisfactory ‘Kai Havertz, and let slip the dogs of war’ joke. And I’ve failed. That joke is not out there. It doesn’t work. It can’t be made. I need to accept that, and move on with my life.”
I never took you for a quitter.
46 min City get the second half under way. Arsenal have made a change: Gabriel Martinelli, who equalised from the bench in the return fixture at the Emirates, is on for Noni Madueke.
“Arsenal would happily settle for this scoreline and therein lies the risk,” writes Krishnamoorthy V. “At the risk of an hyperbole let me say this is the most important 45 minutes of this season.”
That Cherki goal gets better every time you see it. The touch and sleight of hip to beat Gabriel and Rice was pure Maradona. And though he finished with his right foot, for the rest of the run he was hugging the ball on his left like Diego.
Half-time reading
Half time: Manchester City 1-1 Arsenal
All square after a vigorous and often dramatic first half at the Etihad. Arsenal have played with admirable intent and deserve to be level, even if their goal was blooperlicious. Rayan Cherki put City ahead in the 16th minute with a gorgeous slalom; two minutes later, Kai Havertz equalised with a block tackle on Gianluigi Donnarumma.
The draw suits Arsenal, especially if they achieve it playing like this. City will hope to take control early in the second half, just as they did at Wembley last month.
45 min Just one added minute.
44 min “The emotion on display in the lead photo of Donnarruma after his screw-up is incredible,” writes Zach Neeley. “The most unbelievable athletic creatures but still as emotionally sensitive as the rest of us. Not me though, definitely don’t need to get in a sensory deprivation tank during half-time.”
43 min Another corner from Bernardo Silva is headed off the line by Saliba, this time at the far post. A foul was given for a block by O’Reilly on David Raya so it wouldn’t have counted, but those corners are worth keeping an eye on.
43 min Bernardo Silva’s inswinging corner is headed away by the player on the line at the near post. Good job as Raya was on the far side of goal and Bernardo may have been trying to score. I’ve no idea any more.
42 min Cherki dizzies Gabriel with a series of stepovers, then slips past him on the edge of the area and tees up Semenyo. His shot is well blocked by Hincapie.
41 min Madueke’s inswinger is headed away by Haaland. City have defended Arsenal’s corners pretty well so far.
40 min Arsenal respond with a good move. Mosquera crosses towards Havertz, who is shaping to volley at goal from eight yards when Khusanov belts the ball behind for a corner. Important interception.
38 min O’Reilly almost puts Rodri through with an imaginative angled pass that is crucially cut out by the stretching Zubimendi. This is City’s best spell of the game.
36 min Mosquera is booked for pulling back Doku, who had rolled him expertly and would have been away. Doku has been City’s most consistent attacking threat, even if it was Cherki who scored that glorious goal.
35 min “We were told in Act I of this season that Donnarumma was bad with his feet but we had to wait until Act III for it to pay off,” notes Niall Mullen. “Nice to see the Premier League obey Chekhov’s rules.”
34 min City have had 68% possession in the last 10 minutes. They love taking control of a game by stealth.
33 min Rice concedes a corner with an important tackle on Bernardo Silva, who was trying to get a pass from Haaland out of his feet in the penalty area. The corner is half cleared and curled back in by Khusanov. Guehi gets up early at the far post but heads straight at David Raya. Tough chance.
31 min O’Reilly is boxed in by Havertz and Madueke deep in the City half. A stud roll and a nutmeg later, he’s away from both and City are on the attack. Delightful composure and skill from a special young player.
29 min Madueke runs at Guehi, who stays on his feet and makes a good challenge. The ball deflects back off Madueke and behind for a goalkick, an ostensibly trivial detail but one that matters when Arsenal are playing. No opponent wants them to be receive any bonus corners.
27 min O’Reilly moves smoothly through the inside-left channel and finds Doku. He plays a sharp first-time pass into Haaland, who swishes well wide from the edge of the D. Half a chance.
26 min “Well,” says Eric Peterson, forwarding his email that we published at 2 mins, “this didn’t age well.”
25 min A bit of a lull in what has been a compelling first half. Arsenal continue to be far more aggressive without the ball, an approach that was rewarded spectacularly when Havertz equalised.
22 min The equaliser was a shambles but Arsenal deserved it on the balance of play. They’ve started really well and are going toe to toe with City in a manner few people expected.
20 min A chance on the break for City. They are three on two, with Haaland in possession, but he overhits a simple angled pass to put Semenyo through on goal. Semenyo tries to retrieve it and slips over.
19 min In the biggest game of the season, Kai Havertz has scored with a block tackle! And to think some people criticise Arsenal’s style of play.
Nunes threw the ball back to Donnarumma, who took a slightly heavy touch on the edge of the six-yard box and was pressed by Havertz. Donnarumma tried to hack the ball away but it was too late: Havertz charged it down and the ball ricocheted into the net.
GOAL! Man City 1-1 Arsenal (Havertz 18)
Arsenal equalise after an epic howler from Gianluigi Donnarumma!
What a goal. What a goal. Rodri chested a loose ball to Cherki just outside the area; he caressed it with his left foot to acknowledge receipt and then ran at a backpedalling Arsenal defence. Cherki moved into the area, zig-zagged between Gabriel and Declan Rice – don’t ask me how, because the gap was non-existent – and calmly passed the ball into the far corner with his right foot.
There is so much to love about that goal: chutzpah, balance, a velvet touch – and finally a resting heart-rate finish. Cherki ends his celebration by looking at the home fans as if to say, ‘Yeah yeah, I am the best.’ Right now it’s hard to argue.
GOAL! Man City 1-0 Arsenal (Cherki 16)
Rayan Cherki gives City the lead with an individual goal of the purest genius!
14 min Arsenal’s intent has caught City a bit cold. Eze puts Havertz through on goal with a suspicion of offside. Havertz’s touch is abysmal, Donnarumma collects and then the flag does go up. Havertz probably lost concentration because he knew or at least thought he was offside.
10 min Two fine passes from Rice and Odegaard set up a shot from Havertz that deflects behind for another corner. Rice swings it in, Donnarumma punches clear.
Arsenal are playing with impressive intent and have already won the ball four times in the final third. They only managed that four times across the last two trips to the Etihad.
8 min Arsenal have started to get on the ball themselves, and there’s no sign yet that they intend to park any buses.
6 min Two corners for Arsenal. The first flashes dangerously across the face of goal; the second is headed wide by the leaping Mosquera beyond the far post. Half a chance.
4 min: Cherki hits the post!
A near-post cutback from O’Reilly is met first time by Haaland. His shot is blocked, then Cherki’s follow-up hits Gabriel’s upper arm and spins onto the inside of the far post. The ball bounces across the goalline and is cleared.
City implored Anthony Taylor to give a penalty; he said no and VAR agreed. Gabriel was leaning towards the ball but with his hands behind his back. I suspect VAR would have upheld the on-field decision either way.
Never mind the penalty appeal – Arsenal were so lucky that the ball didn’t spin into the net after hitting the post.
4 min So much for the sedate start. Gabriel plays a goalkick square to Raya, who takes a wretched first touch and is this close to being sacked/flattened/embarrassed by Haaland. That’s crazy, and it has got the crowd going.
3 min It’s been a fairly sedate start, with lots of City posssession but nothing where it hurts.
2 min “Not to be Debbie Downer,” begins Eric Peterson, “but if form holds, I have a suspicion this game will feel like a root canal for at least the first 45, if not the first hour. These two have a tendency to play way too cagey with each other when there’s so much at stake.”
Not to be Debbie Downer…
1 min Arsenal kick off from right to left as we watch. As expected, Eberechi Eze is playing as the left-sided attacker.
Pep Guardiola and Mikel Arteta greet each other with a handshake and a warm embrace. Now it’s time for their players to steer this title race in one direction or another.
“One interesting piece of fitba news before the main event gets going, Rob,” begins Simon McMahon. “Celtic led St. Mirren 2-0 at half time in the Scottish cup semi final, but were pegged back early in the second half before St. Mirren took over and forced extra time with an equaliser in the 91st minute, Celtic seemingly on the ropes and there for the taking.
“It’s now half time in extra time, with the score Celtic 6-2 St. Mirren. Football, eh..?”
“I dunno, Rob,” writes Charles Antaki. “For all the careful explanations I’ve heard that Arsenal will be okay and that City won’t win the title, all it does is call to mind the equally careful and persuasive explanations that bumblebees can’t fly, rockets won’t work in space, and a rich and successful democracy can’t descend into authoritarian craziness. And yet here we are. I don’t think there’s any substitute now for simple blind faith for a couple of hours this afternoon. At the end of it, let the devil take the hindmost – as he surely will.”
What do Eric Cantona, Marc Overmars, Didier Drogba, Vincent Kompany and Leroy Sane all have in common? Yes, very funny.
The correct answer is that they they have all scored the decisive goal in games that were – or ultimately became – Premier League title deciders.
Jamie Jackson
Pep Guardiola believes if Manchester City replicate their second-half Carabao Cup final display against Arsenal “for 95 minutes” in today’s pivotal title meeting with Mikel Arteta’s side they will win, though the manager expects his opposite number to make adjustments for this key clash.
Barney Ronay
OK, so it was all building to this, then. The slow‑burn plotlines. The room‑temperature action sequences. The winter afternoons on the sofa watching men wrestle unhappily, staring out of the window as the frigid wind tousles the clouds, wondering about the death of all things, and also why referees not only have to speak now but speak in the same awkward Yorkshire bingo‑caller voice.
All of this. It’s all actually fine. Because it turns out this was just delayed resolution, cinematic build, the sporting equivalent of a really long closeup of a man in a wide-brimmed Mexican hat narrowing his eyes and chewing a cigar. And now we get the payoff. The Etihad on Sunday afternoon. The clink of spurs. The tick of the clocktower. Townsfolk huddled at the saloon-bar shutters. Get ready for an old-school shootout.
So maybe this is how it’s going to go down. Manchester City as the avengers, in pursuit of an Arsenal team they have tracked across the plains from October to April. And a game that is as close as we’ve had in some time to a late-season title decider.
Arsenal have drawn their last two games at the Etihad, including a thrilling and spiteful contest in September 2024. But their last win on this ground was many moons ago: January 2015, when Frank Lampard was a City player and Sky Sports’ Mike Dean was the referee.
Rob Draper
When Pep Guardiola was preparing for the challenge of taking on Jürgen Klopp’s peak Liverpool team at Anfield in February 2021, training that week at Manchester City was a little different, according to Oleksandr Zinchenko. Guardiola’s instructions seemed counterintuitive. “Guys, let’s start from the goal-kick, I want you to make at least three or four touches on the ball,” the manager told them. “Most of the teams come to Anfield and shit themselves. They want to play one touch, two touch. ‘Oh, don’t give me the ball! Oh you take it!’ But you have to play with big balls at Anfield! Big balls! ‘Give me the ball!’ Demand it! If you need to dribble past two or three players, do it. But play football. I want you to play football.”
Zinchenko recalls that Guardiola made the same speech before they walked out at Anfield. “Teams coming here are scared. They play one or two touches, and that’s what Liverpool like, because they get the ball back so quickly. I want you to be brave. Play your football!” as Zinchenko puts it in his autobiography, Believe. Admittedly that game came in the midst of City’s record-breaking 21-game winning run that season but was also Guardiola’s first win at Anfield, so not dissimilar to the title showdown at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday with Arsenal.
Premier League results
This is what those results do the Premier League table.
There’s been a 100th-minute winner in the first Merseyside derby at Hill Dickinson Stadium. Clickity click click!
All sorts of late drama at Villa Park, where the seventh goal of the game has just been scored. Tom Bassam has the latest on Aston Villa v Sunedrland and Nottingham Forest v Burnley, while Daniel Harris is watching 11 minutes of added time in the Merseyside derby.
Manchester City gained ground last weekend but the league leaders have plenty of reasons to remain positive, writes Oliver Hopkins.
David Hytner
Mikel Arteta will go all out for victory in today’s Premier League title showdown at Manchester City and has not thought for “one second” about setting up for a draw.
Arsenal are six points clear of City, albeit they have played an extra game, and a stalemate could move them decisively towards the trophy they crave. According to Opta’s projections, Arsenal would have an 89% probability of winning the title if it finished all square at the Etihad Stadium.
Jonathan Wilson
At half-time in the Carabao Cup final, Arsenal’s hopes of a quadruple remained strong. They were unbeaten in 14, 11 of them won. They were drawing 0-0 against Manchester City and it wasn’t unreasonable to think that if the second half carried on as the first half had, they would eventually find a winner – quite possibly from a corner.
They had drawn a Championship side in the sixth round of the FA Cup and a Portuguese side in the quarter-finals of the Champions League. They held a nine-point lead in the Premier League. This was shaping up to be the greatest season in Arsenal’s history.
That was four weeks ago. There remains a possibility of a Premier League and Champions League double, which would be remarkable enough, but the mood is very different now. This could become the most disappointing season in Arsenal’s history, if only because they came so close to winning it all.
Well that’s Mikel Arteta’s teamtalk sorted!
Team news: Havertz starts up front
Manchester City are unchanged, no surprise given their recent form. Mikel Arteta has made two changes to the side that drew against Sporting in midweek: Martin Odegaard and Kai Havertz replace Gabriel Martinelli and Viktor Gyokeres; it’s Odegaaard’s first Premier League start in almost three months.
Arsenal have a few options in midfield, but the likeliest scenario is that Noni Madueke and Eberechi Eze will play as the wide attackers.
Man City (4-2-3-1) Donnarumma; Nunes, Khusanov, Guehi, O’Reilly; Bernardo, Rodri; Semenyo, Cherki, Doku; Haaland.
Subs: Trafford, Reijnders, Stones, Ake, Marmoush, Nico, Ait-Nouri, Savinho, Foden.
Arsenal (4-1-4-1) Raya; Mosquera, Saliba, Gabriel, Hincapie; Zubimendi; Odegaard, Eze, Rice, Madueke; Havertz.
Subs: Arrizabalaga, White, Jesus, Martinelli, Gyokeres, Norgaard, Trossard, Lewis-Skelly, Dowman.
Referee Anthony Taylor.
Preamble
We should have known it was always going to end this way. For most of the season, it looked like Arsenal were strolling to their first title in 22 years without a serious challenge. It was a ludicrous assumption, one that disrespected the weight of history and the voracity of Pep Guardiola.
The clues were all there. Guardiola’s decade-long dominance of the Premier League; his complex relationship with Mikel Arteta; the intense recent rivalry between the sides. Had Arsenal won the league without overcoming City, the narrative police would have wanted a word.
Today’s game isn’t necessarily a title decider, but it sure feels like one. For the neutral, the fact it’s at the Etihad makes it even more mouthwatering. This is where Arsenal’s first title challenge under Arteta was ruthlessly extinguished by Kevin De Bruyne, a defeat so devastating that it instantly turned Arteta from a romantic into a pragmatist. If Arsenal are to win the league, having their own Marc Overmars moment today will make it infinitely sweeter.
Except they don’t really need to win. For all the talk of Arsenal needing to hurt a rival on their own patch, a draw would be an outstanding result given the mood of both teams and the state of the league table. Arsenal are six points clear having played a game more; if they avoid defeat today, they will be the only team with the title in their hands.
It’s a big if. All the momentum is with City, which is ostensibly odd given they have drawn two of their last three games. But those two draws came before the Premier League’s spring break, during which City outclassed Arsenal in the Carabao Cup final and Liverpool in the FA Cup.
At the same time, Arsenal went out of the FA Cup to Southampton. A change in mood was confirmed by last week’s Premier League resumption. Arsenal lost at home to Bournemouth, when the result was less alarming than their angst-ridden performance, and City blew Chelsea away in the second half at Stamford Bridge.
It feels like all the pressure is on Arsenal. The reality is more nuanced. City have to win to keep the title in their own hands; Arsenal simply cannot afford another defeat. Something has to give.
Kick off 4.30pm
