Haaland shows Gabriel Jesus who is winning the Premier League

Carlo Garganese

• Updated: 23 Apr 2023 16:06 BST
• 4 min read

It would take a brave man to bet on Arsenal winning the Premier League now.

Three successive draws against Liverpool, West Ham and Southampton means that Manchester City can go top of the table if they win their two games in hand.

Man City also host Arsenal at the Etihad on Wednesday and will be red-hot favourites to win that on the back of a sensational run of form.

Premier League top scorers 2022/23: Erling Haaland

City are flying, having won 10 games in a row in all competitions prior to their 1-1 Champions League draw in Munich against Bayern which sealed a 4-1 aggregate victory in the quarter final.

There are many reasons why Arsenal have begun to fall away in recent weeks - they have actually won just three of their last eight matches in all competitions.

Their defence has started to fail them - leaking seven goals in three games - but the lack of experience and older heads in a young squad that has not won much has also been pivotal.

Another big difference between Arsenal and City has been in the number 9 department.

City’s striker Erling Haaland has broken record after record this season, scoring a frankly ridiculous 32 Premier League goals in 28 games - and 48 in 41 in all competitions.

Arsenal’s first-choice striker, Gabriel Jesus, has just nine goals in 27 games in all competitions.

Jesus, of course, arrived at the Emirates from City last summer in a £45 million deal.

In terms of his overall game and influence on the team, Jesus has been an excellent signing for Arsenal.

He sets the tone for everything that Arsenal do well. He presses from the front perfectly, making it extremely difficult for the opposition to get out.

His movement and link-up play is superb - especially with Gabriel Martinelli and Bukayo Saka, allowing the two outside attackers to flourish.

And despite standing at just 5ft 9in his hold-up play and his work with his back to goal is very impressive.

But there is one thing that is missing from Gabriel Jesus’ game – he just doesn’t score enough goals.

Gabriel Jesus' lack of goals

His 99-day injury absence from December to March notwithstanding, nine goals in all competitions from 27 games is not enough for the striker of a team who wants to win the Premier League.

Until he scored against Leeds on April 1, Jesus had actually gone 14 games without scoring for the Gunners.

During Friday’s 3-3 draw with Southampton, Arsenal were made to pay for Jesus’ toothlessness in front of goal.

He missed some huge opportunities and scored zero goals from an xG of 1.44 on the evening.

In fact, Jesus now has the biggest xG underperformance in the Premier League this season, with nine goals from a 13.3 xG.

The biggest xG over-performer in England? Erling Haaland.

We are seeing the same shortcomings from Jesus with Arsenal that we saw at Man City. In four of his six seasons at City, he failed to hit double figures in the Premier League.

It was hoped that playing as the first-choice number 9 at Arsenal, his numbers would improve. And indeed they did in the early weeks of the season as he scored five goals in his first nine games.

But now we are seeing the same issues at Arsenal that we witnessed at City.

The league is still not over for Arsenal. If they can somehow get a positive result at the Etihad on Wednesday, it could reignite them for the run-in. And a few more goals from Jesus would certainly help in that regard.