Arsenal get Premier League title race boost as Man City hit by crisis

Manchester City have suffered a double injury blow during their 2-1 Carabao Cup defeat to Tottenham Hotspur - one that may yet have repercussions on their Premier League title race with Arsenal.

Goals from Timo Werner and Pape Sarr helped the Gunners' North London rivals past Pep Guardiola's team - marking their first defeat of the season - who were also reeling from their fresh issues on the night.

Defender Manuel Akanji was forced out of the team after picking up an injury during pre-match build-up, before winger Savinho was stretchered off at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. That duo have now been added to a list already consisting of Rodri, Kevin de Bruyne, Kyle Walker, Jack Grealish, Jeremy Doku and Oscar Bobb.

All Arsenal are able to do is focus on themselves and what they produce on the field of play, yet it seems impossible not to take the odd glance towards their title rivals.

After all, the only thing that has stood in the way of Mikel Arteta and his players getting their hands on the coveted trophy has been Man City. Two seasons ago the gap at the top of the table was five points, and last year it was reduced to just two. Defeat in this endeavour for a third consecutive year would be a painful blow, and so Arsenal will do all that is in their power to break the dominant force in English football.

They do have their own problems, of course. We await full confirmation of the extent of Gabriel Magalhaes' newly-acquired problem that saw him taken off against Liverpool, then Martin Odegaard, Riccardo Calafiori, Kieran Tierney and Takehiro Tomiyasu have also been sidelined in recent weeks.

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Knowing that they are all on the road to recovery, Arteta therefore can take confidence from their rivals gradually becoming worn down at a greater rate. As things stand following their Carabao Cup exit on Wednesday night, Pep Guardiola only has 13 senior players to call upon heading into the weekend.

The fresh problems they face came after Guardiola bemoaned his weakened ability to rotate in the cup in the wake of his existing issues.

"Now we have a problem that we have a lot of injured players and I cannot rotate like I would and I don't want to put much pressure on the young players on this stage for this opponents for the way I play so that's why I have to make a mix for the players, split minutes with 45 minutes-45minutes," the Spaniard said.

Speaking after the game, Guardiola added: "We are 13 players (available) so we are in real difficulty. The guys that play, they finish most of them with problems and we’ll see how they recover.

"I think when we are in trouble, like we are because in nine years it never happen this situation with many, many injuries for many, many reasons, in these situations, the players they make a step forward and they are more together than ever and they will try to do this week in this short time to recover.

"It’s tough. Akanji yesterday, I didn’t know it, in the last action felt something in the muscular part of his body and today in the warm-up he didn’t feel good. He said he could take a risk and I said no, no risk.

"Ruben (Dias) is struggling sometimes as well in some moments. It’s been getting more difficult game by game, but maybe one day we will arrive altogether.

"That’s why the guys who are here and making an effort to be with us, fighting to be with us and playing with pain and focus for us, these guys I will not forget it."

With City in the midst of a crisis, if Arteta can keep his side fit and firing, with any kind of luck things will finally fall into place.

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