The time has arrived. Arsenal and Manchester City face-off in a fixture that has been labelled the final of this season’s Premier League. The Gunners are five points clear of City heading into the clash but have failed to win in their last three games.
Pep Guardiola's side do have two games in hand over Arsenal, but today's mouth-watering clash looks set to play a telling role in where the Premier League title ends up at the end of the season.
Mikel Arteta's side have been dealt a triple blow to their title hopes in recent weeks, with consecutive 2-0 leads squandered at Liverpool and West Ham followed by further points dropped against Southampton at the weekend.
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If the north Londoners are to make history and win their first league title in 19 years, they would be doing themselves an enormous favour with victory at the Etihad Stadium. However, they will be without defender William Saliba and face an anxious wait on Granit Xhaka.
The midfielder missed Friday's draw with Southampton due to illness, with Fabio Vieira taking his place in Arteta's side. It remains unclear whether the Swiss will be back in time for today's game, with Arteta providing an update on Tuesday. He said: "Granit has been out. Hopefully he’ll be able to train today but he’s still a doubt. The rest are OK."
Saliba hasn't played since being taken off against Sporting CP in the Europa League. "We’re still hopeful, but another week has gone by and he hasn’t been able to train with the team," Arteta added.
"At the moment we don’t have him. We are preparing the game without him and probably the next game will come too soon as well. We have to go week by week at the moment."
He remained coy on the specifics of the issue though, saying: "I’ll leave that to the doctors to explain."
That means Saliba, Mohamed Elneny and Takehiro Tomiyasu are the only absentees for the trip to Manchester. Elneny and Tomiyasu aren't expected to play again this season.
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