What Next For These Two Teams?

By Azeez Said

Arsenal's run of 15 games without defeat in away matches came to an end when they faced a rejuvenated Manchester United side last weekend. To those who are are accustomed with history at least for the past half decade, the result would not have come as a surprise even if the Gunners were in blazing form.

Does it mean Arsenal are title pretenders?

Arsenal being at the top of the league has come as a surprise to most people but they really merit their position on the league table. Their ability to maintain their position and still be there come May next year has been met by skepticism across the football world due to their past failings in the same position in previous seasons.

Arsenal have had their most testing spell in this first half of the season meeting Chelsea, B. Dortmund (twice), Liverpool and Man Utd and winning 2 out of the 5 matches loosing the others. Impressive, I will call it since people thought they would come out of this matches with nothing to show for it.

Arsenal have got the ability to come back stronger in their next matches like they did after their opening day defeat to Aston Villa at home. There is also good news in that some of their injured players would be back after the international break. Obviously, in some of their matches they have lacked attacking options from the bench with Walcott, Podolski,Ox all out injured. In the league this year, lots of points are going to be dropped along the way. It is just a matter of who drops points the least to win the league.

Where does this leave Manchester United?

Manchester United are back in the title race! Yeah, back I said. Knowing that defeat against the Gunners would have left them with a near impossible 11 points to catch, they got the job done against the Gunners even if not in scintillating fashion.

Now, they are a point behind 4th placed Chelsea and 5 points behind  the leaders. Having already played Liverpool,Chelsea, Man city and Arsenal in the league, they have a host of winnable fixtures coming their way. They showed against the Gunners that they can still compete with the best after loosing their previous matches against top opponents.

With only 6 points separating first placed Arsenal from eight placed Man city, it will be ''a close-run league this year''.