Arsenal best prepare for Tottenham derby classic

Having held up their part of the bargain in beating struggling Brentford last time out, Arsenal expected the same from the side widely considered as the finest in world football.

The previous matchweek coughed up a near perfect scenario for Mikel Arteta’s side with the teams around them dropping points alongside the win at Molineux, results that included Tottenham losing three Premier League matches on the spin.

Facing Manchester City away from home felt like a home banker to extend that run to four in succession. But in some weird and inexplicable way, City hate playing Spurs. Why can’t they have a normal bogey team like Burnley or Newcastle? Why them?

What was a glorious win for Antonio Conte’s side was a pretty demoralising one for the rest of the top four chasing pack.

Arsenal best prepare for seismic Tottenham derby clash with Premier League yet to rearrange potential top four deciding fixture

It keeps Arsenal’s bitterest rivals in the slipstream, while Wolves and Manchester United secured victories of their own to make this, from a neutral perspective at least, one of the more exhilarating ends to a season for quite some time.

All sides in the hunt for Champions League football are going to drop points they shouldn’t and pick up the occasional surprise win, with the table telling us at this minute that there isn’t much to separate the teams. The path appears to lead us down one where so much will hinge on the head-to-head clashes. One of which is yet to be rearranged: Tottenham vs Arsenal.

There is nothing stopping the Premier League from having announced a date for that fixture yet.

Arsenal’s home tie with Liverpool has already been pencilled as part of a hideous looking spell of three games in six days, and the Reds are still in every competition going. To have found a date for that fixture and not the Tottenham one points to a clear plan in place.

The broadcaster, set to be Sky Sports, want this game to be a Champions League deciding bonanza. It’s going to happen in May. April at the very earliest.

Leaving it this late without a date is building the excitement. It’s going to be an event. There are still two matches to fill in for Arsenal with Chelsea and Spurs both away from home, and fact we’ve heard nothing yet for the latter means we’re set up for midweek clash, under the floodlights, sometime in the spring. It’s inevitable.

And with the way the season is panning out at present, it has the potential to be a top four clinching clash. It’s going to be neck and neck all the way until the end, with other sides also firmly in the conversation, so Arsenal best prepare themselves for what has all the ingredients to be a seismic North London Derby.

Derby day is agony at the best of times. You dare not contemplate how the emotions may be come then.