Once again. West Ham just taking swipes at our players. Ref gives a free kick but much better protection is required

Sterling close with a free kick.

Jorginho stood 3 yards in front of Fabian’s to make it more awkward for him to set up his wall. Ref tells him to move away. What actual rule is Jorginho breaking there?

3 points in the bag
3 more in midweek would be great

5 mins added time, West Ham player goes down injured for 2 minutes of it. Whistle blows bang on 95 minutes.

Of course it doesn’t matter but if we’re talking about trying to raise standards of refereeing then these things do matter. The standards should be elite and not reacting to the state of the game to make your decisions.

It’s the same for us, we should be happy with the win but most of the analysis will be how we let them back in with 2 quick goals. Sloppy.

We’re on a run now. Got to hope all the players that started can be fit for Wednesday and we can get Partey and Merino back as well

Saka 5 goals and 11 assists.
Level with Salah on 16 goal contributions in the league. 75 odd more minutes played by Salah despite playing a game less

It does feel like Saka goes up a level every season.

Loved those first 35 minutes. It’s the most dominant I’ve seen any team in the league this season.

Don’t know how Jorginho does it, doesn’t play for a while, but comes straight in and doesn’t need time to get up to speed, just runs games and is exactly what we needed. We have to keep him around the club. If he’s happy with the role he has I’d give him another year deal with the promise of a coaching role when he wants.

Only just about to turn 33, has never had or relied on pace. He runs the game in his head.

Arteta said Saka is fine and Calafiori was a planned sub to manage his load.

Haven’t heard on Gabriel. Hopefully just precaution following the lunch to the head.

Arteta said Gabriel was a precaution as he felt a niggle which was similar to the one v Sporting. Need to be really careful with him.
We’re already having to manage Calafiori minutes and ideally would be doing the same with Timber after his long injury but no one can step in for him right now.
Desperate for Tomiyasu to be fit but it seems a way away yet.

Bloody lunched him in the head!

Arteta seems more ready to sub off Saka in games now than he was before. Just through prem subs Saka has missed over 100 minutes of games. Plus the game he missed v Bournemouth. Obviously much easier to do this when the game is done and dusted with 20 minutes to go

It’s funny how everyone analyses our set pieces to death but we still keep scoring them. Jover and the boys are one step ahead. I’ve seen pundits say what teams should do against us but I’m in no doubt if they did we’d have another plan.

Our set piece goals are obviously sneered at by rivals and haters but in some ways they can be more difficult to score because the defence has a chance to plan for them and be completely set how they want which they can rarely do in open play. You know what we’re going to do, you know who takes them and you know the guy we’re aiming for and still can’t stop it.

It also ignores that if set piece goals were in any way ‘easy’ then why can’t every team score them like us?

Liverpool v City today. Really hoping for a draw.
In 9 seasons Pep has only won at Anfield once, which makes a mockery of the assertions that Neville and co make that you have to go to your nearest rivals ground and make a statement win

Its crazy to think that the club seemed to be contemplating letting Gabriel go at the beginning of last season.

That was odd. I don’t think we ever heard the full story about that. He’s pretty much indispensable now

Bloody hell we were good yesterday. Really does sweeten the weekends when we play like that.

Saka and Ødegaard are unplayable right now. The latter must be one of the best attacking midfielders in the world right now. The only thing missing for him is goals really

Probably not the club, only Arteta

Have to say Liverpool incredibly lucky to play City in their current state. Of course Liverpool can only beat what’s in front of them and they are totally dominating City today. Gundogan/Lewis central midfield is awful

Max Dowman became Arsenal’s youngest ever player to play for the U21 side, he’s 14

Wow, what a miss from Salah.

Liverpool really should have killed it by now.

One thing the premier league demands is an abundance of pace and power in your team. You can obviously have smaller technicians but you have to have others with pace and power who can win the fight and stretch teams - or cover transitions.
This City line up is just massively devoid of pace and power. Haaland has it but a midfield of Gundogan, Lewis, Foden, Silva, Nunes feels so lightweight and one paced

Incredible miss. City already look better with Doku and Savinho on.

Would love a City equaliser

Liverpool 2-0 up. Looks done and dusted now. We’ll take more bad news I for City I guess, but Liverpool seem to be tripping over 4-leaf clovers and lucky rabbits feet atm. Hopefully they can smash some mirrors and get some normal luck sooner rather than later!

Liverpools to lose now.

City are terrible without Rodri. Walker looks past it too.

Martinez and Mainoo from Man U both reached 5 yellow cards today so both will be suspended for our midweek game v Man U

Wow that’s a big plus.

We'll need them to have a lot of bad luck.

Amazing how bad City are. Just 2 shots on target.

Long way to go yet. Injuries matter but so does the fixture list. Playing Man Utd in October is very different to playing them in December. Likewise playing Arsenal with most of their defence missing also helps..

Just normal luck would make a difference! It’s extraordinary the way the fixtures and player availability for opposition has fallen for them!

Excellent news from the utd Line up maybe our luck is turning, although it’s suddenly a different prospect now under Amorim. Surprise surprise Liverpool have already played them away under Ten Bags.

Isak limped off this weekend and Liverpool play Newcastle midweek. That’s a game we have to really be looking at for Liverpool to drop points. If they win at Newcastle that’s a huge blow

Emery’s form hasn’t had much coverage. He’s at his level, he thrives in the mid team underdog position. We were absolutely correct to sack him and hire Arteta….despite what the media lined up to tell us

I’d love to get Liverpool in the cup I want to play them again before the away game which is only 3 games before the end of the season.
We played them hugely depleted and were the better team for most of the game. They’ve got the best player in the league but I just do not believe they are a better team than us.

We’ve us everything possible go wrong for us this season, they’ve had everything possible go right for them. Let’s see when they have to face genuine adversity

That's why I still feel some hope.

We haven't had the rub of the green at all. Apart from the toughness of the fixtures, we had those two absurd reds, mediocre players scoring worldies, the injuries, and, what rankles the most, the lost leads against City, Liverpool, and Chelsea. Our position 9 points back feels like a false one.

Its a huge amount of points to make up, but if it comes down to us having to win at Anfield, I'd back our current team to beat them.

Fixtures are key, there’s a huge swing between what we’ve faced and what Liverpool have.
In their 6 away fixtures they’ve played the teams currently in 20th, 19th, 18th, 17th, 9th and 2nd

We’ve gone to City, Spurs, Villa, Newcastle, Chelsea.

In the same 13 fixtures Liverpool have won 34 points from this season we also won 34 points from last season.

Liverpool have basically slipped up once in the PL so far. The draw at home to Forest. 11 wins and a draw away to us. It's not luck. They are annoyingly good. We can go on about fixtures but they just beat Real Madrid and Man City in the space of 4 days. They are top of the CL too. If they don't have a drop-off soon, they will be coasting along miles ahead.

I don't know. Frontrunning all season is pretty tough, as we know. Liverpool are bound to drop points now and then, and even at 9 points ahead they will feel pressure if we continue to win. They will remember the 2018-19 season.

We just have to make sure that if they do drop off (and they only need to lose a couple and it is back in our hands), we are the ones who pick up the pieces. Chelsea are also lurking.

Yep. They also did a pretty good impression of choking last season when they were in title contention, dropping points in four out of five games near the end of the campaign.

Yes, it’s totally forgotten that Liverpool were top, 2 points clear with 8 games to go last year. It’s made out like it was just a City v Arsenal race. Liverpool crumbled

Agreed that are playing really, really well, but the Madrid and City teams they just beat were absolute shadows of what they are. Both were missing a whole raft of key players and are both in awful form. If you were a Liverpool fan and you could hand pick the circumstances of playing both you’d be told you were being too far fetched to come up with what unfolded for them.

In City's line up v Liverpool Haaland was the only player with a goal in the league. Only 5 other players in the entire squad have scored a prem goal this season.

I argued a while ago that having a group of players who all score 12-15 goals a season is more sustainable than 1 guy who gets 35 and others just chip in small numbers. In Haaland's last 7 or so games his xG is better than Salah's. Salah has just been more effective with similar chances. So Haaland goes off the boil and City struggle.

The only caution I'd have is whilst I thought we were a much more rounded team the loss of Ødegaard showed that we are not immune to drop off if we miss a key player