Overview
The defeat to Wolves once opened up an opportunity for Manchester City to narrow the gap to 2 points with Arsenal. Pep Guardiola's team took advantage of that with a victory over Newcastle United.
This made the North London derby with Tottenham Hotspur extremely tense. However, Igor Tudor's Tottenham could not resist when Viktor Gyokeres's double and Eberechi Eze's 2 goals helped Mikel Arteta's team win 4-1.
That victory helped Arsenal re-establish a 5-point gap at the top. Except for Declan Rice's mistake leading to Randal Kolo Muani's goal, this was an overwhelming performance - exactly the style that the "Gunners" needed to affirm their position as championship contenders.
Man City still has one match to play and will be guests at Leeds United's stadium before Arsenal enters the next London derby with Chelsea at the Emirates.
Liam Rosenior's Chelsea just dropped 2 points in the last minute against Burnley. However, they also have a week off to prepare for this match.
The two teams met in the Carabao Cup semi-finals, where Arsenal won 4-2 overall. In the second leg, Chelsea was criticized for their lack of sharpness. They had 14 shots but only 2 on target, xG reached 0.64. Kai Havertz scored the decisive goal for Arsenal.
This weekend, attacking responsibility will fall on Arsenal's shoulders, especially if Man City gets a favorable result against Leeds.
Arsenal has only lost one of their last 25 London derbies in the Premier League (18 wins, 6 draws). The only defeat was against West Ham United.
Since the beginning of the 2022-2023 season, Arsenal has only been silent in 2 of the 44 London derbies - both against West Ham.
Meanwhile, Chelsea lost 8/9 of their most recent away matches in the Premier League to the leading team. They only won once against Man City in 2021.
Chelsea have been guests when Arsenal led the group nine times and only won one match, since 1948.
Although only 5 teams in the top five European leagues conceded fewer goals than Arsenal (21 goals), and have the lowest xGA index (19.2), The Gunners have committed four direct errors leading to goals conceded since the beginning of 2026 - accounting for 44% of the goals conceded this year.
Chelsea also won both away matches in the Premier League under Rosenior. The most recent English coach to win the first 3 away matches was Tim Sherwood in the 2013-2014 season.
However, Chelsea dropped 19 points from the lead this season - only behind West Ham (20 points). They scored first in the last 2 matches but have not won.
The first leg in November last year ended 1-1, with Mikel Merino's equalizer for Arsenal at Stamford Bridge. Chelsea then also played with one less player after Moises Caicedo's red card. Chelsea has received 6 red cards this season, and Rosenior needs to ensure that the team maintains better discipline.
On Arsenal's side, the recent derby double may help Eze regain his form. He has scored all 11 recent Premier League goals in London. Of which, 6 goals this season have come in the London derby.
The most recent Arsenal player to score more derby goals in a season is Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang in the 2018-2019 season (7 goals).
Head-to-head record
In his second match leading Arsenal in December 2019, Mikel Arteta lost to Chelsea 1-2 at the Emirates Stadium.
Since then, Arsenal under Arteta has only lost one of their 15 encounters with Chelsea in all competitions (10 wins, 4 draws).
In fact, 10 wins against Chelsea is the best achievement Arteta has achieved against an opponent when leading Arsenal (equal to 10 wins against Wolves).
Arteta's Arsenal also scored 31 goals against Chelsea - more than any other opponent he has faced as "Gunners" coach.
Chelsea has not won against Arsenal in the last 8 matches in the Premier League (3 draws, 5 losses). This is their longest winless streak against this opponent since 1995-2005 (19 matches).
Arsenal have beaten Chelsea in their last 3 home matches in the Premier League. The last time they had a longer winning streak against The Blues at home was in the period 1990-1994 (5 consecutive matches).
Score prediction: Arsenal 1-2 Chelsea
The match between Arsenal and Chelsea takes place at 11:30 PM on March 1st (Vietnam time).
