Former Manchester United captain Wayne Rooney (Picture: Getty)
Wayne Rooney believes upcoming games between Arsenal and Manchester City will be the decisive factor in this season’s title race.
Arsenal’s surprising midweek draw against bottom-of-the-table Wolves has made the Premier League title race all the more interesting.
And while the Gunners still lead by just five points over Manchester City, they have played a game more than Pep Guardiola’s side and face a potential banana skin in Sunday’s north London derby.
City, meanwhile, are riding high off four consecutive wins in all competitions, and could pile on the pressure on Mikel Arteta’s side with a victory over Newcastle United on Saturday.
There is no doubt set to be more twists and turns in the coming matches, but all eyes are already turning to a key few weeks, starting next month, when both sides face each other on several occasions in quick succession.
March’s Carabao Cup final will see Arsenal and City come face to face, before the two sides head to the Etihad for a huge league clash in mid-April.
And in between that, the top two sides in the league could also face off in a Champions League quarter-final first leg if both make it through their respective round-of-16 ties.
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Manchester City and Arsenal will meet on several occasions in the coming weeks (Picture: Getty)
And five-time Premier League Rooney believes those stretch of games will hold the key to the title race.
‘I think a big factor is going to be if they meet in the Champions League,’ he said on the Wayne Rooney Podcast.
‘The emotion around them games, and the Carabao Cup final and the game at the Etihad [in the league], the emotion around them games and what that will bring, whoever comes out on top in those will win the league.’
And asked to stick his neck on the line and make a title prediction, Rooney said: ‘I think Arsenal. Just.’
Arsenal uncharacteristically dropped points against Wolves in midweek (Picture: Getty)
Not everyone was keen to indulge in title talk this week, though, with Guardiola batting away several questions from reporters in his press conference on Friday.
‘Twelve [more] games is a lot, like I said before. So Newcastle is my only concern,’ the City boss said.
‘We will be concerned about the League cup final against Arsenal when it is coming up, but for now it is Newcastle, a rest and after it Leeds. It has always been like that.
‘As a journalist, I understand you want to anticipate what is going to happen. That doesn’t count. It is Newcastle, that is all.’
Arteta, meanwhile, said his side had moved on from Wednesday’s disappointing result and were now full focus on putting things right against Spurs on Sunday.
‘What I have seen is a tremedous reaction and no surprise at all,’ he said. ‘When you lose points in a very unpredictable manner, is no one can really understand that.
‘That was a chapter, chapter 27 says we draw against Wolves in this manner, what I am intrested in is the next one. Writing our own destiny, life moves on.’
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