Arsenal and Manchester City face tough battles after stalemate | Football

Arsenal and Manchester City are both extremely short odds-on favourites to pick up Wednesday night wins to pile the pressure back on Liverpool at the top of the Premier League.

But although both the Gunners and the defending champions should send their supporters home happy after victories on home soil, neither side is guaranteed an easy time.

Arsenal gained a marvellous point at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday and may well go to town against Luton, who have cooled off a bit since taking 11 points from 18 around the turn of the year.

But it shouldn’t be forgotten that it took an injury-time winner from Declan Rice to give Mikel Arteta’s team a 4-3 victory at Kenilworth Road at the start of December and since hefty back-to-back defeats against Liverpool and City the Hatters have gone five games in which they have scored, drawn twice and been beaten three times by a solitary goal.

Arsenal have kept clean sheets in five of their last six league matches but they did concede at home to Brentford just a couple of weeks ago and the slight leaning is towards them to win and both teams to score at 6/4 with Betway, Betfred, BoyleSports and Sky Bet.

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Also take Luton +2 goals at 3/1 with Paddy Power and Betfair while it may be worth having a saver with the Hatters +3 at evens with Betway, BoyleSports, Ladbrokes and Coral. Meanwhile, Martin Odegaard is 2/1 with Sky Bet to score at any time.

Aston Villa could be put to the sword by Pep Guardiola’s side as City seek to make a statement after dropping those two points against the Gunners.

But guess who are the only team to have beaten the kings of Europe in their last 33 matches in all competitions? Yup, that’s right it’s Villa who enjoyed a 1-0 win in front of the Holte End on December 6.

Unai Emery’s side have only lost one of their last six league games, winning four of them, as they chase fourth place and a definite ticket to next season’s Champions League and they can keep it close enough to back them +2 goals at evens with Ladbrokes, Coral, Betfred and Sky Bet.

Kevin De Bruyne is 9/1 with Paddy Power and Betfair to open the scoring and 11/4 with Sky to hit the net at any time in this one.

• Anyone else think Jurgen Klopp’s gushing praise for Brighton boss Roberto De Zerbi at the weekend was a thinly veiled recommendation for the Italian to succeed him at Liverpool in the summer? The Italian is 11/2 with Paddy Power and Betfair to be sitting in the Anfield boot room as the next Reds manager and Brighton are 9/5 with Coral, Betfair and SpreadEx to win at Brentford, whose wasteful finishing meant they struggled to get a point against a poor Manchester United side on Saturday. 

MORE : Rio Ferdinand reveals the Arsenal star ‘Declan Rice has been raving about’

MORE : Bukayo Saka fitness update provided by Mikel Arteta ahead of Arsenal vs Luton

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