Arsenal did the hard work against Aston Villa but then just collapsed. One ‘liability’ must go and it feels increasingly likely that Mikel Arteta might too.

A horrifically modern term it may be, but some gameweeks shift the atmosphere of a Premier League title race so tangibly as to feel inexorable.

It is not unfeasible that someone out there believes this to be very much on, that there is an individual who pulled their attention away from Liverpool after 35 shots and 90 goalless minutes at Brentford, before calling time on Arsenal‘s relatively comfortable home stroll against Aston Villa after about an hour.

The results seemed set but Liverpool ground out precisely the sort of win champions do, while Arsenal collapsed exactly like champions don’t.

‘Fine margins’ is a phrase oft used at the sharp end of elite football and this, in a way, was that. A gap extended back to six points was tantalisingly close to becoming just two. And the beauty of that Liverpool game in hand is that it is malleable depending on the mood: an optimistic Red or pessimistic Gunner automatically incorporates those three points into their maddening run-in mathematics, the same way a defeatist Liverpool fan or positive Arsenal supporter impulsively imagines David Moyes guiding Everton to the most ludicrous of rescheduled wins.

But it was also the opposite. There was nothing ‘fine’ about this surrender of a two-goal lead, nothing ‘marginal’ in the way Arsenal changed nothing, excelled, changed nothing again, looked suddenly vulnerable, and then continued to change nothing until it was too late to change anything.

There is reactive, there is proactive and there is inactive. Mikel Arteta embodied the latter.

He managed a difficult game masterfully throughout the first half and opening ten minutes of the second. Arsenal started brilliantly and tapered off somewhat but kept Villa at arm’s length. Even when Ollie Watkins led a breakaway and tried his trademark stepover, touch out wide and low shot back across goal, Jurrien Timber stood him up and escorted him off the premises.

It was a professional job handled impeccably, rewarded when Gabriel Martinelli barely forced Leandro Trossard’s excellent cross over the line.

Trossard again did wonderfully to expose Matty Cash early in the second half before whipping a ball into Kai Havertz, who doubled the lead and silenced the Arsenal Need A Centre-Forward narrative for another week at least.

But then it went wrong, and it is painfully awkward that nothing in particular triggered it. When every microcosm and minutiae of the game is analysed to a laughable extent in big 2025 by clubs and coaches hoping to eliminate any semblance of chance, and vast swathes of data are available to any fan and pundit aiming to establish explanations for why the smallest things happen, mere complacency feels like a cop-out answer.

Yet really what else was this? The absence of William Saliba? Perhaps but this is supposed to be a better, sturdier, stronger Arsenal who do not crumble without their leader. The last time they failed to win after leading by two goals in the Premier League was April 2023, when the Frenchman’s injury derailed their title challenge. Those same frailties should not exist almost two years later – and Gabriel is a) arguably a better leader, b) certainly a better defender this season, and c) was very good against Villa.

Arteta implied fatigue after the game and while it might have played a part, Villa halved the advantage in the 60th minute and equalised in the 68th. This was no late disintegration because of tired legs and Arsenal inevitably pushed far harder and came far closer to a winner in the subsequent half an hour or so.

Even the lack of signings in the January transfer window is an unsatisfactory simplification of this specific result. Arsenal led 2-0. They toiled a little in scoring but did so twice nonetheless and were secure, at home, to a team in fairly volatile form.

Dropping two points from that position in any context is poor but straight after a transformational Liverpool win it was abysmal.

The visitors did not burst out of the blocks in response to the Havertz goal. Youri Tielemans scored in their first sustained attack of the half and Watkins levelled with maybe the third or fourth. Villa had no shots from the 35th minute until the 59th, then scored with two of their next three and hit the post with the other.

Thomas Partey, a Premier League player in his 30s but absolutely not a right-back, simply ignored the threats posed by Lucas Digne and Watkins for the goals. His undeniable talents do not outweigh the guarantee of at least one costly mistake a game from an increasing liability.

Mikel Merino failed to track his midfield runner. Even Trossard, probably Arsenal’s best player, conceded an unnecessary free-kick in the build-up to Villa’s second after doing the hard work of catching up with a countering Watkins.

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There was ample time for the Arsenal onslaught but it conjured little more than a hilariously obvious Havertz handball to rule out Merino’s deflected strike, then Merino hitting the post at the start of stoppage time. It is certainly fair to say they lacked attacking depth at that point to alter the game – Raheem Sterling was both the only substitution used and also really quite bad – but Arsenal should never have needed to change anything.

The first goal could be vaguely forgiven as a momentary lapse but it was also a warning they refused to heed. If bringing on another defender at 2-1 might have been a little too far then at least the midfield control of Jorginho or even Oleksandr Zinchenko could have been used. Calling on the bench at all would not even have been necessary with a slight tactical shift to concentrate on defending more robustly instead of immediately pushing for a third to restore that cushion.

The collective decline in focus lasted all of eight minutes but defined a season of maddening imperfection designed to undermine greatness. Arsenal have already dropped points in as many games as last season and a team whose longest run of consecutive victories this campaign is three likely needs to win the next 16 without exception to stand just a small chance of lifting a title their manager looks increasingly incapable of delivering.

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