Barclays Premier League: Arsenal vs Manchester United – Preview

Arsenal host Manchester United at the Emirates this weekend, hoping to take all three points off of the newly crowned champions to boost their chances of qualifying for the Champions League next season.

The main talking point surrounding the fixture has been about Arsenal giving Manchester United a guard of honour before kick off as they have just won the league. Many Arsenal fans are upset about Arsenal having to do it, but it is worth noting that United did it for us in 1991 and also congratulated Arsenal when they won the league title at Old Trafford in 2002. Chelsea also received a guard of honour from them when they won the league in 2005.

The main reason Arsenal fans don’t want to do it is because Robin Van Persie is now a Manchester United player and his switch to Manchester last summer still stings many that support the Gunners. Seeing him win a league title and play a huge part in doing so definitely hurts, but it does show you how far away Arsenal are from competing for a title right now unfortunately. I think that despite the fact the two clubs were huge rivals 10 years ago, had Van Persie not gone there last summer, Arsenal fans wouldn’t have had such a problem with the guard of honour.

Much of the talk surrounding this fixture is Robin Van Persie’s return to the Emirates. Pic: The Telegraph

Arsene Wenger confirmed Arsenal will do the guard of honour on Sunday and personally I agree that it is the right thing to do. Get the guard of honour out of the way and then hopefully beat them on the pitch. It shows class doing the guard of honour and it is the right thing to do, regardless of what you think of Van Persie. I feel the same way about Van Persie that a lot of Arsenal fans do, at the moment I can’t stand the sight of him, but it’s still right to do a guard of honour. If the shoe was on the other foot, you’d be calling United fans bitter about it and pathetic if they didn’t do one. So I agree with the club’s decision on this matter.

Doing the guard of honour is a lot better than watching United win the title at the Emirates, think of it that way.

Team News: Arsenal will be without Olivier Giroud after the club’s appeal of his red card at Fulham was turned down earlier this week. Lukasz Fabianski is out with a rib injury, so Wojciech Szczesny continues in goal for Arsenal, whilst both Ryo Miyaichi and Abou Diaby are out for rest of the season.

Manchester United will play some of their fringe players now that their title has been secured. I’m not saying Arsenal will win the game but if United play their fringe players, it’ll increase the chances of an Arsenal win on Sunday. It’ll be tough no matter who they put on the pitch, they’re champions for a reason, but with Arsenal having something to play for and United already having the title in the bag, it could help the Gunners.

Arsenal vs Manchester United – This used to be a fantastic rivalry. I loved the days when Vieira and Keane were fighting in the tunnel before the game had even started, Arsenal players ganged up on Van Nistelrooy and a little Cesc Fabregas reportedly threw food at Sir Alex Ferguson. A lot has changed since then. Arsenal aren’t as strong as they used to be. They were United’s biggest threat every year, but since then both Chelsea and Manchester City have had billionaires take them over and slowly Arsenal have become less relevant in the title race and more often than not content with just qualifying for the Champions League.

10 years ago if you had told me we would sell our captain and top goalscorer to United I would have laughed at you. Could you imagine Thierry Henry or Patrick Vieira playing in the red of United. Never. A sickening thought for any Arsenal fan. It was bad enough when Vieira joined City towards the end of his playing days, let alone United.

It is not quite the same as it used to be, but if Arsenal have a summer where they strengthen big and go for it, Arsenal and United could well be competing again. At the moment Arsenal can’t win any trophy, let alone the league. They’ve come close. Had Eduardo not got injured in 2008, I’m certain they’d have won the league that year. But for a moment of madness between Wojciech Szczesny and Laurent Koscielny in the 2011 League Cup Final, I’m sure Arsenal would have had their platform for many trophies in the years ahead. I think they could have won the league that season if they had beaten Birmingham that day. Cesc Fabregas would have still left that summer, but would Nasri have gone?. Would Van Persie had left if we had won those two cups in 2011?. I’m not so sure.

Whatever you say about the rivalry being dead right now, the Van Persie transfer gave it that edge again.Arsenal just need to get a team that’s capable of competing with them on the pitch once again and Wenger and Ferguson will be hating each other again. None of this lovey dovey ‘we’ll sell you our best striker and the league title for £24m’ nonsense.

Arsenal will go into tomorrow needing a win. They can’t afford to slip up in this one. Spurs got a great result last weekend against City and Chelsea are still strong too. Thankfully Chelsea and Tottenham have to meet in their game in hand over the Gunners, so at least one of them will drop points in that game.

Last Six Meetings:

3/11/12 – Man United (Van Persie, Evra) 2-1 Arsenal (Cazorla)

22/1/12 – Arsenal (Van Persie) 1-2 Man United (Valencia, Welbeck)

28/8/11 – Man United (Welbeck, Young x2, Rooney x3, Nani, Park) 8-2 Arsenal (Walcott, Van Persie)

1/5/11 – Arsenal (Ramsey) 1-0 Man United

12/3/11 (FA Cup) – Man United (Fabio, Rooney) 2-0 Arsenal

13/12/10 – Man United (Park) 1-0 Arsenal

So as you can see, Arsenal’s recent record against United isn’t very good at all. Just one win in the last six and it came in May 2011 at the Emirates. It was a similar time of year, but by then United hadn’t wrapped up the title unlike this time. Despite the fact Arsenal’s result blew the title race open, United did go on to clinch the title in 2011 comfortably in the end.

Arsenal’s last win over Manchester United came in May 2011 thanks to an Aaron Ramsey goal. Pic: Zimbio.

As you can see, Robin Van Persie scored two times for Arsenal against United last season, both of which came in losing efforts. The Dutchman’s early goal at Old Trafford in November helped his new club on their way to 3 points against the Gunners. So the Dutchman has played his part for both teams in this fixture.

If Sir Alex decides to rest him tomorrow, it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world…