… and so we wind down with a reminder that Ben Fisher’s report from Villa Park should be your next port of call. Thanks for reading this MBM!
Related: Saka settles gruelling battle with Aston Villa to extend Arsenal’s winning start
… and now it’s Unai Emery’s turn to speak to Sky. “We lost … we compete well … against the winner last year … we are trying to rebuild the team … but a lot of positive things … how we compete … better with the ball … we didn’t create clear chances, but we didn’t concede clear chances … it is positive for the next matches … we had our chances to draw the match … to lose one match is always painful … but after we must try to get positive things … how we can get better … we can feel confidence because how we want to build the team is true … I think the squad we have now is how we planned and has the players we wanted … now we work … work, work, work.”
Mikel Arteta talks to Sky Sports. “I am really happy … a massive win … it’s a tough place to come … we deserved it … a great squad performance … the finishers came in and did a magnificent job … I loved a lot of things I saw from my team … I always trust my players … we have to be really proud tonight … I don’t know [about the potential signing of Julian Alvarez], that is for the people upstairs.”
The match-winner Bukayo Saka speaks to Sky Sports. “Very very tough game, I’ll be honest, yeah … it’s not easy coming here … they made it really really hard for us so it feels even better to come out with the win … they were compact … catching us offside a lot … we weren’t able to implement our attacking patterns like we did last week … we wanted to push for the second … we weren’t at our highest level with the ball tonight but without it we were incredible … all the boys put in a shift … that helps with a clean sheet.”
Then, after an awkward back and forth with Sky pundit Thierry Henry, who is disappointed that Saka has yet to put up a 15-goal-plus-15-assist season, a statement the player heroically lets slide, Saka is asked if he’s watched Chelsea yet this season.
An entertaining, if slightly odd, interview.
Ben Fisher was at Villa Park tonight, and his verdict has landed. Here it is … but a reminder that this MBM isn’t pulling down the shutters yet, as we wait to hear from both managers. For potentially awkward browser-based situations such as this, the Guardian recommends the implementation of a two-tab system.
Related: Saka settles gruelling battle with Aston Villa to extend Arsenal’s winning start
Post-match postbag. “Thank you Matt Emerson (min 90+5). We do seem to be immediately back in the days of angst, gritted teeth, shouting impolite words at the screen, and generally hating football in the last 10 minutes of a match with only a one-goal lead. For the Arsenal fan, nostalgia is exactly as it used to be” – Charles Antaki
“Arsenal fans have a song for occasions like this. What’s Basque for George Graham?” – Kári Tulinius
Arsenal went about their business in the non-nonsense style. They stayed together, they held firm, they remained patient, and when Eberechi Eze and Riccardo Calafiori combined down the inside-left channel for the one moment of true quality in tonight’s match, Bukayo Saka couldn’t miss the tap-in they’d teed up. They celebrate their win and head off to prepare for the visit of Chelsea on Sunday. Two wins out of two for the champions, just as it’s two defeats from two for Aston Villa, who have yet to muster an attempt on target this season, and have a lot of thinking and subsequent work to do. They’re off to Hull on Saturday for a game that … well, it’s way too early for a must-win, but Villa won’t appreciate the noises off if they fail to take anything from that one as well.
90 min +9: McGinn steps across Gabriel, who nicks him from behind. But there’s no free kick. Seconds later, McGinn barges into the defender, who topples over with an affronted look on his face. It nearly bubbles over, but there’s no time for any of that, because …
90 min +8: Eze crosses from the left, looking for Guimaraes, romping in from the right. Maatsen slides in, a scissor action, but catches ball rather than man, which is just as well. It would have been a clear penalty otherwise.
90 min +6: Maatsen clatters Saka out on the right touchline in the you-shall-not-pass style. Into the book he goes. Villa frustrated, Arsenal doing a good job of running down the clock.
90 min +5: McGinn clips Merino out on the right touchline. On a booking, the Villa captain wants to watch himself here. Nothing comes of the free kick. “Looks like the carefree, freewheeling Arsenal, released from the burden of not winning the title, has lasted one whole match,” observes the tinder-dry Matt Emerson, one eyebrow hoisted high.
90 min +3: Buendia and Wan-Bissaka apply pressure down the right, but Guimaraes muscles them both out of the road, before ushering the ball out for a goal kick. Then he celebrates as though he’d just scored the clincher.
90 min +2: It’s all Villa in terms of possession … but they can’t get anything going in the final third.
90 min: There will be eight additional minutes! There’s been a lot of substitutions and some hot VAR action, to be fair.
89 min: Suzuki races out of his goal to deal with a long ball down the middle. A powerful header clear. And this is as good a time as any for Ben Suenaga, of 50 min fame, to explain himself re Japanese superstars in the Premier League: “I know I bring shame by uttering the words but for once with Suzuki we can have a protagonist .”
88 min: How’s this for a stat, flashed up by Sky Sports? Aston Villa have yet to have a shot on target this season! Coventry next on the list with four attempts, while Palace, Leeds and Forest have had five.
86 min: Saka wins a corner down the right … then wastes it. McGinn tries to find Garnacho with a long pass … but overhits it. Raya claims, and waits an age with the ball at his feet before a Villa player closes him down. Abraham finally arrives, and as Raya picks up, both players have a short conversation. For a second, it threatens to escalate, but the two grown men eventually see sense. We play on.
85 min: Zubimendi comes on for Rice, who isn’t moving freely.
84 min: Maatsen scampers down the left and enters the box, going over as Rice and White sandwich him. He screams for a penalty, but there’s no way that’ll be given. And it isn’t.
83 min: Arsenal are sitting back, holding their shape. Villa seeing the majority of the ball for the first time this evening.
81 min: Now McGinn goes into the book for an agricultural lunge through the back of Merino. That wasn’t so great, and he’s lucky the referee has been, for the most part, in a laissez-faire mood tonight.
80 min: Alysson is booked for a late clip on Gabriel.
79 min: Mosquera is indeed unable to continue, so Konsa comes on for his Arsenal debut … and though there’s a few boos, the majority of home fans applaud their former player, who played such a big part in last season’s Europa League victory. That a lovely – and pretty cool – moment.
78 min: … but first, a couple of Villa debutants, as Garnacho and Wan-Bissaka come on for Barkley and Cash.
77 min: Mosquera goes down with what looks like cramp. Looks like a baptism of fire coming up for erstwhile Villa hero Konsa.
75 min: Suzuki makes good by saving from Havertz, the Arsenal striker having been put clean through by Guimaraes. Havertz opened his body and looked for the bottom left, but the keeper won the duel with a fine parry.
74 min: Havertz has a dig from the edge of the box. Suzuki spills the shot, which rebounds the best part of ten yards in front of him, but there’s nobody in 1979 yellow to take advantage, and he covers the ground to gather.
73 min: Alysson immediately gets involved, tearing his way past Calafiori down the right. He’s unable to find anyone in the centre with his low cross. His aim not so true.
72 min: … so Aston Villa respond by throwing on Abraham and Alysson, at the expense of Jackson and Hemmings.
70 min: Arsenal send on Merino and Guimarães in place of Lewis-Skelly and Odegaard …
68 min: Odegaard finds Havertz in space inside the box on the right. He’s tugged back by Kamara, but neither ref nor VAR shows any interest in giving a spot kick. Then Villa go up the other end, Maatsen nibbled at by White as he cuts into the box from the left, but ref and VAR collectively shrug again. Just about everyone in the crowd fuming, for one reason or another.
66 min: Hemmings strides into a pocket of space down the middle of the park. He’s got Barkley to his right, but tries to release Jackson down the middle with a slide-rule pass. Rice is on point to intercept with a swagger.
65 min: … and so having said that, Villa finally reach the Arsenal box, McGinn embarking on a baroque ramble down the inside-right channel. But he can’t get a shot away, and when he cuts back for Cash, Calafiori is on point to deal with the danger.
63 min: … and as if to prove that point, Arsenal slip straight back into a state of calm authority. Villa are yet to respond.
61 min: That goal had sort of been coming. On Sky, Gary Neville points out that Arsenal hadn’t really looked like scoring, but were in the ascendency and staying patient, and finally got their reward.
That little chain of events had put Villa fans in a good humour. But they’re not so happy now. Gabriel finds Eze to the left of the box. Eze plays Calafiori in down the channel. Calafiori slides ahead of Lindelof to meet the pass and whip it low into the centre, and Saka, beating his old foe Maatsen, can’t miss from a couple of yards.
57 min: Odegaard whips a cheeky free kick over the wall and inches wide of the right-hand post. Suzuki hadn’t been expecting it, and wouldn’t have got there. Goal kick.
56 min: VAR gets involved. Maatsen did foul Saka, leaning into his back … but the foul occurred just outside the box, to the right of the D. It’ll be a free kick to Arsenal instead.
54 min: Maatsen’s woes continue as Saka nips in ahead of him down the right, and he leans in from behind, bringing the winger down as he enters the box. After some thought, the referee points to the spot.
52 min: Thinking about that, Ben … Shinji Kagawa (Manchester United), Shinji Okazaki (Leicester City), Takumi Minamino and Wataru Endo (both Liverpool), Japanese Premier League title-winners all, may want a word.
50 min: Rice curls a delicious cross in from the right, but Havertz can’t beat Lindelof in the air at the far stick. Suzuki claims. Speaking of whom … “Here is hoping Japan have our first Premier League superstar in Zion!” begins Ben Suenaga. “Quite a jump coming from Parma but he is looking right at home. No disrespect to Mitoma and Daizen.”
48 min: Maatsen looks for Jackson this time, with a pass down the left touchline, but only manages to roll the ball out of play, nowhere near his team-mate. Not the best 60 seconds of his career.
47 min: Barkley spots Maatsen in acres of space out on the left. He loops a pass down the flank. Maatsen enters the box and, with only Jackson in the middle, and not in that much space, opts for the spectacular, aiming for the top-left corner. He finds the top-left corner of the Holte End.
Aston Villa get the second half underway. Arsenal have hooked Tzolis, who was on a booking and involved in a running duel with Cash, and replaced him with Eze.
Half-time postbag II, because why not? “Football refereeing is so stuck in the subjective age and so little reference is made to the actual stated rulebook that there will no improvement in consistency or ‘fairness’. Listen to the TV refs in rugby and cricket and they quote the rulebook and say whether what has happened does or does not comply with the factual rule. VAR in football is just the pundit class pontificating about this or that with little or no reference to any particular rule. I don’t like VAR for what it does tot he flow of the game, but being applied this badly just rankles with my sense of decency” – Nic
“Judging by his delivery to camera in the kit video, a career in the movies beckons for John McGinn after his playing days are over. He’s got the cheeky chappie Scot ex-footballer with a twinkle in his eye parts sewn up” – Simon McMahon
Half-time postbag. “I know the new stand will benefit Villa in the long term, but it feels like another thing counting against them at the moment: they could really use the extra support after the summer they’ve had. Always had a soft spot for Villa and hope they do well, but feel like this season could turn into a real struggle for them. Like a flirting with relegation-type struggle. Hope I’m wrong” – Joshua Keeling
“Emery is a splendid coach and a Villa legend, but this enforced rebuild needs to work and it needs to work fast. I am excited by Suzuki and Manzambi but Gomes, Goretzka, Wan-Bissaka, Jackson and Garnacho have bigger question marks than I’d like, and I’d have much rather been adding them to the squad for options than relying on them to hit the ground running. Plenty of Villa fans say ‘In Unai we trust…’ but… I’m trepidatious. Fingers crossed we can get a decent result tonight to build my confidence, and that of the squad!” – Benjamin Gravestock
“Arsenal fans must be delighted that Aston Villa have now taken on the mantle of encouraging us to Visit Rwanda” – Gary Byrne
A half that started promisingly but petered out a bit. The xG of 0.09 to 0.34 sounds about right, and tells most of the story.
45 min: There will be one of your additional first-half minutes.
43 min: Jackson skins Gabriel down the right and makes it as far as the box, but his low cross evades Hemmings at the near post.
41 min: A ball sent into the Villa box from the left. Torres leans into Calafiori, arm on back, and the Arsenal man goes over. He wants a penalty, but neither referee nor VAR shows any interest in awarding one, presumably citing the Not Enough In It For Me law that doesn’t exist but is so beloved of the pundit class. It’s a foul, though, isn’t it, no matter how soft? But here we are.
39 min: Cash clatters into the back of Tzolis, who wants more punishment meted out than the free kick that’s awarded. The referee’s not interested in booking Cash, and once the free kick is wasted, Tzolis gets dog’s abuse the next time he touches the ball.
37 min: Arsenal have enjoyed 73 percent of possession over the last ten minutes. They’ve not done too much with it.
35 min: White takes an age over a throw. It’s 12 seconds before the referee tells him to get a wriggle on, and 15 before it’s eventually taken. Villa not happy; they want the ball turned over to them. The referees have obviously tired of the new laws already. Good old PGMOL, or whatever they’ve been rebranded as this time.
33 min: Buendia crosses from the left. Jackson can’t meet it ahead of Raya, who claims. That move was started by another flawless Suzuki long pass, creamed down the right channel this time towards McGinn. The Japan keeper, excellent at the World Cup, looks the business.
31 min: Kamara skittles Lewis-Skelly 40 yards out. Odegaard loops the free kick into a crowded box. A game of head tennis breaks out before Villa clear. Arsenal’s set pieces haven’t been up to their usual standard. So far.
29 min: Following his early flap, Suzuki has made a couple of impressive saves, and now he pings a spectacular 60-yard searcher towards Hemmings on the left. Nothing comes of the move, but what a pass that was. Suzuki has already earned a couple of loud and appreciative rounds of applause, and that was met by the loudest and most appreciative of them all.
28 min: Saka is clipped out on the right and it’s another opportunity for Arsenal to do their set-piece thing. They load the box. Rice takes … and hits a peculiar flat free kick that’s easily cleared by first-man Maatsen. Tzolis tries to get something going again down the left, but is dispossessed by Cash. He hauls him back and goes into the book.
27 min: Maatsen slaloms in from the left, enters the box, opens his body, and slices what was supposed to be a curler into the bottom right wide of the target.
25 min: Saka wins a corner down the right. Saka hoicks it to the near post. Rice flicks a fine header towards the top right; Suzuki tips over acrobatically, with fine reactions. The whistle goes, because Gabriel stupidly yanked McGinn to the floor at the far post, nowhere near the action, and Rice doesn’t win the corner his header deserved.
24 min: “Champions of Europe, you’ll never sing that,” sing the fans of the 1982 European Cup winners to their 2006 and 2026 Champions League runners-up supporting counterparts. The tune bounced along rhythmically, unlike that last sentence.
22 min: Our first sweet taste of that xG sauce: Villa 0.05 to Arsenal’s whopping 0.34. It’s been more engaging than those numbers suggest.
20 min: Cash throws in long from the right. McGinn and Calafiori compete in the Arsenal box. The former kicks the latter in the face, but it wasn’t a high kick, and Calafiori was stooping low. Gabriel isn’t happy about it, but nobody else, not least the injured party himself, complains. Happily, the defender is quickly back up and about with no damage done.
19 min: Villa go up the other end, McGinn winning the home side’s first corner of the evening … then wasting it by failing to beat the first man.
18 min: Space for Tzolis out on the left. He wins a corner off Cash. Rice slings it in. Calafiori flicks a header over the bar, though Mosquera had fouled someone amid a melee, and the whistle goes anyway.
16 min: Arsenal are beginning to impose themselves on this match, enjoying the larger portion of possession. “The North Stand work won’t help the PSR ledger this year, either,” writes Pete Mumola. “Villa are rated pretty low in the table on matchday revenue. A season of reduced capacity isn’t going to help them amid this much changed side. Emery has worked wonders at this club. Even this season may be beyond his powers.”
14 min: … and that should have been the first one, as Odegaard releases Havertz into the Villa box down the right with a cute dink. Havertz opens his body and … slices wildly across the face of goal and away from danger. Ah, hold on, his blushes have been saved by the offside flag, but even so. Blush away; the net should have billowed nevertheless.
13 min: Saka cuts in from the right and blazes over. A sense that there could be goals in this. It’s been open and fun so far.
11 min: Kamara and Tzolis tussle down the Villa inside-right. Tzolis falls, and has maybe been tugged back, but the referee waves play on, and the ball breaks to Buendia, who takes a first-time whack from distance. It pings off the top of the crossbar, Raya beaten all ends up. Arsenal would have been fuming had that gone in, because Kamara’s challenge wasn’t so obvious or egregious that VAR would have definitely stepped in.
10 min: Saka bothers Maatsen with a dribble down the right, but just as he’s about to enter the box, Hemmings arrives to help his team-mate, and strips Saka of possession. My goodness, Hemmings is tenacious.
8 min: It’s not been a banner two-minute period for McGinn, who passes out from near his own corner flag, straight to Tzoils. He shuttles the ball infield from the left to Lewis-Skelly, whose shot from the edge of the box is deflected over the bar for a corner … from which Suzuki flaps alarmingly. Villa’s new keeper is very fortunate that Gabriel, who wins an easy header, sends it well wide left, then the flag pops up for offside.
7 min: Hemmings chases what appears to be a lost cause down the left, but White dithers and allows the 19-year-old Villa midfielder to wrest the ball from him. Hemmings lays back to McGinn, who wastes all that good work by leaning back and hoisting a wild shot miles over the bar and into the building site.
5 min: Odegaard passes down the inside-right channel to … nobody. As the ball dribbles out for a goal kick, the Holte End – which is very much still there, and still populated – whoops and cheers ironically. All good knockabout fun. “Viktor Gyökeres has been left out of the Arsenal XI again,” observes Charles Antaki. “Early days, of course, but there is a lurking feeling that this might be the beginning of the dimming of Gyokeres’ star, not that it ever shone particularly brightly. Even if no out-and-out striker is recruited, the preference for Kai Havertz upfront, deputised occasionally perhaps by Mikel Merino, might prove sufficiently fruitful to keep Gyokeres on the subs’ bench. Of course, this is all laughably premature and will be overturned when the man comes on and scores a hat-trick, while displaying the combined gifts of Eusebio, DiStefano and Pele. We shall see.”
3 min: Some space for Cash down the right. He’s got options in the middle but can’t beat the first man.
2 min: A noisy but nondescript first couple of minutes. All three sides of Villa Park bouncing.
Unai Emery embraces his Arsenal successor Mikel Arteta warmly … presumably congratulating him on his 250th Premier League match in charge. And then the warmest of ovations to remember the recently passed Jimmy Rimmer, who won the league and European Cup for Villa, and also played for Arsenal during the 1970s, winning their player of the season award in 1974-75. Finally Arsenal get the ball rolling.
The teams are out! You know what everyone’s wearing. A reduced capacity of around 37,000 at Villa Park, with the North Stand closed for the season to facilitate its expansion. We’ll be off in a couple of minutes.
Pre-match postbag. “Poor Villa. They were so great last year. Then management sells off the heart of their team. Today they will get embarrassed by the Gunners. What a present to their ever loyal fans” – Mary Waltz
“In all the fuss about Ollie Watkins refusing to play and then leaving, i’d forgotten that Tammy Abraham was on Villa’s books. What must he be thinking that they were so desperate to get Nicolas Jackson into the club (and first team) despite underwhelming at Chelsea and doing nothing at Bayern? Didn’t Abraham do pretty well last year for Villa and was a reliable goalscorer during his time in Italy before signing?” – David Wall
“Three Arsenal goals against Coventry stemmed from the opposing centre-back positions. Aston Villa need good quality centre-backs. The current centre-back crop is no good” – AnhTuan Nguyen Huynh
“Drake’s seven is still the record for most goals in a top-flight game. I wonder if even Haaland could equal that” – Andrew Goudie
“My goodness, Scott, I thought that the Americans were overdoing it with the obscure stats during the World Cup with their recanting of how Paraguay had very rarely scored from outside the box at their nine tournament appearances since 1930. And there you are Ted Drakeing us back to the same era in an MBM. You’ll have a fine career as a Soccer TV color * commentator here in the USA USA USA should you ever wish to leave Old Blighty ( * leave the U behind you at Heathrow)” – Justin Kavanagh
Arsenal are also wearing new duds tonight. Their third-choice kit is gorgeous too, and will whisk everyone of a certain vintage straight back to this …
… which should kickstart a campaign to reinstate the little pyramid of AFC cannonballs that used to rest beside the cannon on the crest. Someone, somewhere, make it happen.
Aston Villa will be debuting their new kit tonight. Any old excuse to revisit this wonderfully realised nonsense …
Unai Emery’s double-breasted sports coat is obviously the standout piece in that film, but the Villa shirt itself is retro glam of the highest order. There is a problem though. As far as I can make out, Villa have ditched the blue sleeves on four previous occasions in their history, with results that can be best described as mixed. They won promotion to the Premier League with an all-claret top (trim doesn’t count) in 2018-19. However when they first ditched the blue sleeves, in 1969-70, they fell to the bottom of the old Second Division in short order, and though they got permission from the powers that be to whack the blue back on, halfway through the season, they still went down to the third tier for the first (and as yet only) time in their history. So why they tried it again for a period during the mid-Eighties is anyone’s guess, because predictably enough, the club were relegated to the old Second Division wearing it, having been European champions just five years previously. Let’s see how this one pans out, then.
The fourth occasion? A totally nondescript campaign in 2001-02 which completely ruins the rhythm of this entry. So I’m not mentioning it.
Unai Emery’s turn to talk to Sky. “Good evening … the first match was not as planned but we must keep going forward … today we are playing at home, the first match, the second day of the Premier League … we are looking forward to how we are going to respond … we need to do that as soon as possible … today is a good match for us … it is the best team, Arsenal, so it is difficult … but with our supporters here we are always feeling confident … we need to transmit our positive energy to our supporters … they can come back with the same positive energy we need … we have experienced players … they know how we want to play … today is a challenge … we are changing things, but there are no excuses … we must perform today and adapt as soon as possible … the new players … the priority is the Premier League … I am positive … optimistic … I want to play against the best teams.”
Mikel Arteta speaks to Sky Sports. “We will have time to make changes throughout the game … Villa are a super well-coached team … we know how tough it is to come and win here … we are very conscious of that … but we are very ambitious … we want to be dominant … to suffocate the opponent … to be better than them.”
Tonight’s game has implications at both ends of the Premier League table (and yes it is far too early to be taking these sorts of things totally seriously, but then try telling that to supporters of Hull City). Arsenal can go top if they win by two clear goals, while Aston Villa would drop to the bottom should that happen. But if Villa win, they are guaranteed to rise to 13th place, and could theoretically go as high as eighth, though they’d have to beat Arsenal by seven goals to do that, and they’ve never run up seven against them in 122 years of trying. (Arsenal have scored seven in this fixture, mind, and one man got them all: Ted Drake, in a 7-1 rout in 1935. Drake took nine shots that day; of the other two, one hit the bar and the other, the striker insisted, crossed the line but wasn’t given. But we’re going well off piste here.)
Aston Villa make two changes to the team who found themselves four goals down after 31 minutes at Brighton last weekend. In come two debutants: goalkeeper Zion Suzuki and striker Nicolas Jackson. Marco Bizot drops to the bench, while João Gomes, sent off in that aforementioned debacle-by-the-sea, is suspended. Villa have three other potential debutants on their bench in Alejandro Garnacho, Matteo Ruggeri and Aaron Wan-Bissaka.
Arsenal, coming off the back of their three-goal win over Coventry, are unsurprisingly unchanged. Bruno Guimarães is back from injury and on the bench, waiting to make his first Premier League appearance for the Gunners … as is Ezri Konsa, a Villa player just ten days ago.
Aston Villa: Suzuki, Cash, Lindelof, Torres, Maatsen, Kamara, Hemmings, McGinn, Barkley, Buendia, Jackson.
Subs: Bizot, Mings, Ruggeri, Garnacho, Abraham, Bogarde, Wan-Bissaka, Edward, Lynch.
Arsenal: Raya, White, Mosquera, Gabriel, Calafiori, Lewis-Skelly, Rice, Saka, Odegaard, Tzolis, Havertz.
Subs: Arrizabalaga, Hincapie, Eze, Gyokeres, Konsa, Madueke, Merino, Zubimendi, Guimaraes.
Premier League Matchweek Two (I’ve given up fighting it) concludes with perhaps the most intriguing game of the ten. Mikel Arteta looks to be entering his imperial phase with Arsenal: the reigning champions, widely expected to retain their crown, officially the second-best team in Europe with aspirations to go one better next year. And they started their campaign last week with a breezy 3-0 win over Coventry City. All good.
Aston Villa by contrast are in a state of turmoil. The side that came fourth last season and won Villa’s first major trophy for 30 years has since been stripped of most of its moving parts with extreme prejudice, and though replacement pieces have been ordered, what remained last weekend got thumped 4-0 at Brighton. Unai Emery will need to piece everything together in double-quick time to avoid things spiralling out of control.
Taking all that into consideration, all signs point to victory for the Gunners this evening. And that’s before we consider their record at Villa Park: 15 wins in the Premier League era, more than they’ve managed at any other away venue. But it’s never quite as simple as that, and Villa have won four of their last seven home games against tonight’s opponents, and their last three home fixtures against the reigning champions (Manchester City in 2023-24 and 2024-25, Liverpool last season). So that’s muddied the water a bit. Can Villa rebound from last weekend’s humiliation-by-the-sea, and in doing so spoil Arteta’s 250th Premier League match in charge? Or will Arsenal just keep on keepin’ on? We start finding out at 8pm BST. It’s on!
Related: Saka settles gruelling battle with Aston Villa to extend Arsenal’s winning start
This report is published with credit to theguardian.com. Full available text from the wire is above. Read on theguardian.com →
Source: theguardian.com · Scott Murray. Published 31 Aug 2026, 09:38 pm.
