Overview
When Dominik Szoboszlai's beautiful free kick flew straight into Gianluigi Donnarumma's net, helping Liverpool take the lead against Manchester City, Arsenal must have felt like they had touched the Premier League trophy.
But Bernardo Silva's equalizer, before Erling Haaland successfully converted a penalty in the 90+3 minute, narrowed Arsenal's gap at the top of the table from 9 points to 6 points before the clash with Brentford.
Of course, that number may even be only 3 points when Arsenal takes the field, because Pep Guardiola's team plays at home against Fulham 24 hours before. And therefore, the worry of looking back is completely real.
In the most recent round, Mikel Arteta's team won convincingly 3-0 against Sunderland, with Martin Zubimendi's opening goal in the first half and Viktor Gyokeres's double after halftime.
Since moving from Sporting CP for a large fee in the summer of 2025, Gyokeres has continuously faced questions. However, the Swedish striker is accelerating strongly as he is the top scorer in the Premier League in 2026 (6 goals) and is also in good form in all competitions.
Notably, Gyokeres scored for the first time in two consecutive Premier League matches since wearing the Arsenal shirt, although 6/8 of his goals in the league came against newly promoted teams. However, against a Brentford that is flying with ambitions to participate in European cups right in the debut season of head coach Keith Andrews, he will need the best version of himself.
Brentford just won a thrilling 3-2 victory at St James' Park against Newcastle United, with a late decision goal by Dango Ouattara. One of their big pillars is Igor Thiago, who scored his sixth penalty goal in the Premier League this season. Only Kylian Mbappe and Nadiem Amiri scored more goals from the 11m spot than him in the top 5 European national championships this season.
Not only that, Igor Thiago also achieved remarkable performance at home when scoring 9 goals in the last 10 matches at the tournament, including 4 doubles. Only Haaland scores more home goals than him this season.
Gtech Community Stadium is also a major support for Brentford. In the 2025-2026 season, only Aston Villa, Manchester United, Man City and Arsenal have won more home games than them. However, the 0-2 defeat to Nottingham Forest in their most recent appearance here ended Brentford's 7-match unbeaten streak at home.
More worryingly, Brentford does not have a good record in London derbies at home. They have only won 1 in their last 11 Premier League matches (6 draws, 4 losses) and have gone through 7 consecutive winless matches since the 2-1 victory over Crystal Palace in August 2024.
In the opposite direction, Arsenal is particularly lucky when facing opponents in the same capital. "The Gunners" have only lost 1 in the last 23 London derbies in the league and also only lost 1 in the last 20 away games to other London teams since the beginning of the 2022-2023 season.
Head-to-head record
Brentford's first win in the Premier League when advancing came right before Arsenal, in their league debut in August 2021. At that time, Brentford won thanks to goals from Sergi Canos and Christian Norgaard, who is currently playing for Arsenal, in the squad led by Thomas Frank.
This defeat also caused Arsenal to be defeated for the first time by a newly promoted team in the opening match of the season since the 1976-1977 season, when they lost to Bristol City at Highbury (then Arsenal won 5 and drew 2 opening matches afterwards against the newcomers).
However, since that match, Brentford has not won in 8 encounters with Arsenal (2 draws, 6 losses).
Score prediction: Brentford 2-3 Arsenal
The match between Brentford and Arsenal takes place at 3:00 AM on February 13 (Vietnam time).
