Arsenal 1-0 Newcastle United · Emirates Stadium · Saturday 26 April 2026
Eze scored in the ninth minute. After that it was an hour and a half of watching Arsenal try not to throw it away against a Newcastle side who have lost 16 league games this season. They got through it. Just.
Three points. Back on top. On to Madrid on Wednesday.
WHAT HAPPENED
Thirty seconds in, Osula was clean through on Raya and missed the ball completely. The Emirates went quiet. Then loud. That moment got forgotten about quickly but it probably matters more than people realise.
The goal was the corner routine. Madueke played it short, found Havertz, Havertz rolled it back into the path of Eze outside the box and Eze put it in the top corner. Pope got nowhere near it. That was Arsenal’s 17th from a corner in the league this season. The record was 11. Nobody else in Premier League history has got close to what Arsenal have done from set pieces this campaign. Eze has now scored 10 from outside the box since 2022. More than any other player in England’s top flight in that time. The goal was brilliant. The next 81 minutes were not.
Goal difference: +38
Goal difference: +37
Havertz went off on 34 minutes with something muscular. Eze followed him not long after the break. Raya made a proper save from a Tonali half-volley that dipped right in front of him. Wissa got in behind and volleyed over with an open goal. Newcastle had 64% possession in the second half and Arsenal created nothing. Saka came on late for his first appearance since the Carabao Cup final and almost made something happen. Almost.
Arteta called the injuries “muscular niggles.” That is what managers say when they do not know yet and cannot afford for you to know they do not know.
WHERE IT STANDS
Arsenal 73 points. City 70, game in hand, one goal worse off on goal difference. Four left each to play, plus City’s extra fixture.
City go to Everton on Monday 4 May. Arsenal host Fulham on Saturday 2 May. Win Fulham and Arsenal are six points clear before City play. Drop points and City can go top with a win at Goodison. That two-day gap between Arsenal-Fulham and City-Everton is the only thing that matters between now and next weekend.
BEFORE ALL THAT, MADRID
Wednesday. Atletico away. First leg of the Champions League semi-final.
Arsenal have one win in their last six games across all competitions. Havertz and Eze are doubts. Saka is not match fit. Arteta has a Champions League semi-final on Wednesday, a Premier League title match on Saturday, and a squad with its legs hanging off.
A 0-0 in Madrid is fine. A bad result changes the mood around everything that follows. Arteta said after the final whistle: “We’ll recover and we’re going to start to talk about Atletico now, and we’ll go for it.” How many times can this group of players “go for it” with a threadbare squad in the space of five days?
THE NEXT FORTNIGHT
Fulham are 10th. They have 14 wins all season and nothing to play for. Arsenal should beat them at home. They should have beaten Newcastle comfortably too, and instead spent 81 minutes watching Wissa miss an open goal.
City go to Everton on the Monday night. Everton have been hard to beat at home in the new stadium and are sitting 11th with nothing to play for either. City have a full week to prepare, Haaland has 34 goals this season, and Guardiola’s side have won ten of their last twelve in the league. Take from that what you want.
Work through the numbers and you get to this: both sides win their next two games, the title goes to the final day. Arsenal at Crystal Palace. City at Aston Villa. Emery’s side need Champions League football. Palace are managed by a man who is leaving in the summer.
THE THING NOBODY IS SAYING OUT LOUD
2022/23, second. 2023/24, second. Last week at the Etihad, two posts, a goal cleared off the line, Donnarumma’s disaster gifting them a route back in, and they still went home empty. Saturday they needed Osula to miss an open goal inside 30 seconds and then scraped past a side in the bottom half who have won eight league games all year.
Arteta before the game: “I don’t expect, after 22 years of not winning it, that it’s going to be a path of roses and beautiful music around it.”
Fair enough. But at some point the path has to get a bit easier to walk. Right now it does not look like it will. Wednesday will tell us a lot. Saturday more.
If you want to watch either game live, Proven Quality covers the best football streaming options for Premier League and Champions League fixtures, alongside the rest of our Premier League title race coverage.
