Gary Neville has provided more clarity on why he thinks Manchester City will win the Premier League title and how Arsenal's "desperate" celebrations could cost them. The Gunners secured a dramatic late win against Aston Villa to end a barren run of four games without a victory and Mikel Arteta's men have followed up that triumph with another two commanding victories.
After conceding two against Villa, Arsenal have looked far more assured defensively in recent outings keeping back-to-back clean sheets against Leicester and Everton. Heading back to the victory in the Midlands, a late Emi Martinez own goal sparked bedlum in the away end and on the pitch for the Arsenal stars.
However, to Neville, those celebrations were a little over the top. Speaking to The Overlap, via Metro, Neville admitted: "We have this little [WhatsApp] group on Sky and obviously they know that I’ve nailed my colours to the mast that City are going to win the league and I’ve been getting a lot of stick from Arsenal fans.
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"But after the Villa game I got on the group [and there were messages saying] 'unbelievable win for Arsenal' and I replied: 'It’s all too desperate, too much emotion too early.'
"I think I’ll be right at the end of the season but I might not be – and it sounds daft but emotion in football when you’re playing and you’re that desperate and you celebrate that much, and you’ve still got half the race to go almost, it’s not a good thing.
"You ordinarily don’t celebrate that hard. So after the Villa game, I could understand how big a moment it was, and actually to be fair I didn’t say this publicly, but I thought, 'That’s quite desperate quite early'.
"The emotion is something that is a negative, it’s not a positive in a title race, for me, honestly. You’re right to be worried [about emotional fatigue]."
Despite Arsenal sitting top of the league for much of the season, Neville has consistently reiterated that he believes City will still triumph in May. The former Manchester United defender has once again explained his reasons citing their past experience in the business-end of the season will be invaluable.
He said: "That’s been my stance from day one [Man City winning the league] with them [Arsenal] not being there before. Manchester City will win this league because when it gets to that last 10 games you do start to panic a bit.
"That anxiety kicks in and the pressure builds, you’re playing in the Europa League potentially as well and you’re travelling away from home on a Thursday and you’re coming back playing a league game on a Saturday and everyone is looking at you.
"I do think at that point Arsenal will wilt because they haven’t proven yet to anybody that they can go the distance. I didn’t think Leicester would stay the pace at all, I thought they’d just blow up in the last five games.
"Look, if Arsenal do it, it will be an unbelievable achievement but the reason I take my stance is just because I’ve been around the block."
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