Mark Goldbridge insists Arsenal must beat Tottenham to have any chance of beating Man City to the Premier League title.
The stakes couldn’t be higher for this weekend’s north London derby showdown, as the rivals prepare to do battle with it all on the line.
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The Gunners need three points on Sunday to keep the pressure on City, with the defending champions hot on their heels just a point behind in second place, but with a game still in hand, after their 4-0 destruction of Brighton.
Liverpool’s chances appear to be over after their disastrous Merseyside derby defeat to Everton - something Goldbridge not only agrees with but, as a devoted Manchester United fan, is ecstatic about.
And he hopes Arsenal can do the business against Spurs on Sunday as Mikel Arteta’s side look to stop Pep Guardiola’s ‘juggernaut’ team from being crowned champions again.
Liverpool are out of the title race. I think their fans would admit it and I think Jurgen Klopp knows it.
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For Arsenal, it’s going to be very difficult to hunt Man City down. When you look at City’s win ratio in the last five games of the season over the last ten years, it’s just massive. They’re not going to lose two games to let Liverpool back in.
This game for Arsenal is going to be what it was for Liverpool against Everton, it will be the pin in your title hopes if you lose.
Arsenal have got to go and win to have any chance of stopping Man City from winning the title again this season, which would make it six of the last seven seasons. They’re the best team in the world. They’re a juggernaut.
But it’s a north London derby and it’s at Spurs, and as we saw in the Merseyside derby form goes out the window.
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The motivation from Spurs will be two-fold; One, it’s a north London derby, and two, they’ve got the top four to play for themselves.
Spurs have got a good team and it’s amazingly hard to call with such big ramifications for both teams, because if Arsenal win and Aston Villa also win at the weekend, you could almost say Spurs are only going to get fifth,and if Arsenal lose they’re out of a title race.
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So we couldn’t have a better game to watch on Sunday with higher stakes.
I thought it was a really good game at the Emirates Stadium and I think Tottenham played better than Arsenal, something Arteta admitted after. It’s got all the ingredients to be a cracking game and I actually can’t call it.
I think after Everton beating Liverpool, I almost feel like Spurs might get something from Arsenal too.
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From a Manchester United point of view it’s fantastic - I don’t want Liverpool to win the league!
But there is that love for football that kicks in and, I don’t care what any United fan says, Jurgen Klopp is a likeable guy, he’s passionate and I’m very surprised it’s ended like this.
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I didn’t think we’d be at the end of April saying they're out of the FA Cup, not going to the Europa League final and now out of the title race.
Maybe there is a bit of pressure when you know the manager is going - it’s not necessarily a good thing.
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We saw this with Sir Alex Ferguson and Manchester United when he said he was going to retire ten years sooner than he actually did, we started getting bad results when you’d think you’d get a boost and camaraderie.
It is surprising with Liverpool. You look at their results against Crystal Palace and Everton and you wonder if it’s all had an effect on the players, because they’ve come up short.