{"id":478065,"date":"2025-10-06T12:16:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-06T12:16:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/478065\/"},"modified":"2025-10-06T12:16:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T12:16:16","slug":"premier-league-talking-points-arsenals-title-push-liverpools-recent-struggles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/478065\/","title":{"rendered":"Premier League talking points: Arsenal’s title push & Liverpool’s recent struggles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arsenal\u2019s title push built on defensive strengthpublished at 13:02 BST<\/p>\n

13:02 BST<\/p>\n

Tom McCoy<\/strong>
BBC Sport journalist<\/p>\n

If new leaders
\nArsenal are to land their first Premier League title since 2004 then defensive
\nsolidity could be what sets them apart.<\/p>\n

The Gunners
\nhave conceded just 21 goals in 26 league games in 2025, the best record of any
\never-present top-flight club.<\/p>\n

Remarkably,
\nthey have conceded only eight times from open play in this period \u2013 at least 10
\nfewer than any other side, with Manchester City a distant second.<\/p>\n

By way of
\ncomparison, reigning champions Liverpool have shipped 22 goals from open play
\nthis calendar year, which is almost three times as many as the Gunners, and 33
\noverall.<\/p>\n

Arsenal can
\nnow boast formidable strength in depth, with summer signings Piero Hincapie and
\nCristhian Mosquera providing high-class cover for first-choice central
\ndefenders William Saliba and Gabriel. They are similarly well stocked at
\nfull-back.<\/p>\n

The
\nMerseysiders, in contrast, don\u2019t have much back-up for key duo Virgil van Dijk
\nand Ibrahima Konate, with the injured Giovanni Leoni likely to miss the rest of
\nthe season and Joe Gomez used sparingly so far in Arne Slot\u2019s reign. <\/p>\n

\"Fewest<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arsenal\u2019s title push built on defensive strengthpublished at 13:02 BST 13:02 BST Tom McCoyBBC Sport journalist If new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":478066,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8815],"tags":[748,393,4884,179,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-478065","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-liverpool","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-liverpool","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115327178381663756","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/478065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=478065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/478065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/478066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=478065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=478065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=478065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}