Manchester City Vs Arsenal Takes Centre Stage In The FA Cup Round 16

Posted by Samson Kankan Latest Headlines, Sports News Friday, January 27th, 2023

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – The much anticipated FA cup fourth round encounter takes centre stage tonight at the Ethihad as Growing suggestions that Manchester City goal machine Erling Haaland is the problem were largely quashed on Saturday as the Norwegian scored his fourth hat-trick to take his personal tally (G25) to higher than nine of the other 19 Premier League (PL) teams. That 3-0 win over Wolves provisionally moved City to within five points of league leaders and now-FA Cup opponents, Arsenal.

Whilst the Gunners might hold the upper hand in the PL title race, it’s City who are looking to extend their incredible current nine-game winning run of FA Cup home games. Not ones to hang about, the Citizens have bagged at least three goals in all nine of those cup home victories, and with 13 wins from 16 H2Hs against the Gunners under Pep Guardiola (D1, L2), only the brave would back against them.

Headed by Guardiola’s former assistant Mikel Arteta, Arsenal are enjoying a current seven-game unbeaten run (W6, D1) heading into this encounter. Arteta has instilled his own passion into this group, and without any big name superstars, this is a team that fights for each other on the pitch to great success so far. That’s perhaps typified by backup striker Eddie Nketiah’s return of one goal per match on average since the mid-season break (G6).

However the Gunners did lose their most recent FA Cup fourth round clash against a PL opponent, which was a 1-0 defeat to Southampton in 2020/21, yet they haven’t been eliminated in FA Cup games vs PL opponents twice in a row since way back in 2010-2011. But a win here would certainly bode well for some Arsenal silverware, as they’ve won the competition in each of the last three editions in which they eliminated City.