We look ahead to Saturday’s Premier League clash at the Emirates with our Arsenal vs Brighton prediction and preview. Can Mikel Arteta’s side make it three Premier League wins in a row?
Arsenal v Brighton: The Key Stats
The Opta supercomputer has Arsenal as heavy favourites to claim victory in this game, with the Gunners winning 69.5% of the pre-match simulations. Arsenal topped the Premier League table on Christmas Day for the fifth time, after also doing so in 2002, 2007, 2022 and 2023. However, the Gunners have failed to go on and win the title in any of those previous four seasons. Brighton are winless in their last four Premier League games, the Seagulls’ longest spell without a victory since a run of five between March and April last season.The Premier League action continues to come thick and fast over the festive period, and Arsenal will hope at the very least to maintain their position atop the table when they face Brighton at the Emirates on Saturday at the start of a tough run of fixtures.
After a stoppage-time 2-1 defeat to Aston Villa on 6 December ended a three-month unbeaten run featuring eight wins from a possible 11 in the league, Arsenal have bounced back in recent weeks.
Mikel Arteta’s side followed up a last-ditch 2-1 win of their own over rock-bottom Wolves with a 1-0 victory at Everton last time out, their fourth such result of the season.
Arsenal’s four 1-0 victories is the most of any Premier League side this term, with Viktor Gyökeres‘ first-half penalty sealing the three points after Jake O’Brien’s handball in the Everton box.
As a result, Arsenal have now scored first in 19 games across all competitions this season and won all those matches.
Arsenal could extend their lead at the Premier League summit to five points this weekend, though that would require Manchester City to lose against Nottingham Forest earlier in the day and Aston Villa to drop points at Chelsea.
They’ll be confident of doing their bit at least, given Brighton go into this game following a run of two defeats and two draws in their last four matches – it’s the Seagulls’ worst run of the season.
Most recently, Fabian Hürzeler’s side could only earn a 0-0 draw with promoted Sunderland at the Amex Stadium – coincidentally, that meant no Premier League team have had more goalless draws than Brighton since their promotion in 2017.
The draw with Sunderland was the 12th time in 17 Premier League games this season in which Brighton failed to score a first-half goal; no team have a poorer record this term, and Arsenal – blessed with the best defence in the division – will see this as another reason to back themselves.
Their record against Brighton isn’t spectacular, however, winning just three of their eight (38%) Premier League home meetings with the Seagulls. They only have a lower win rate against Wimbledon (25%) and Liverpool (36%) among sides they’ve faced at least five times.
Furthermore, although they’ve been kept scoreless in their last two league games, Brighton haven’t gone three without a goal since January 2024. Also, each time they’ve scored at the Emirates, Brighton have come away with a result (three wins, two draws).
The Gunners progressed to the semi-finals of the League on Tuesday night, defeating Crystal Palace in a penalty shootout after a 1-1 draw at the Emirates. A Maxence Lacroix own goal 10 minutes from time looked like sending the home side through, before Marc Guéhi stunned Arsenal with an equaliser deep into added time, sending the tie to penalties. After 14 successful penalty kicks, Lacroix suffered more woe, as he missed to send Arsenal through.
Arteta is likelier than Hürzeler to rotate his team with just a three-day rest period after that EFL Cup clash versus Palace, but two of Arsenal’s mainstays are likely to keep their places.
Goalkeeper David Raya – who has kept more clean sheets (58) than any other keeper in the Premier League since his August 2021 debut for Brentford – is set to make his 150th Premier League appearance for Arsenal. Meanwhile, another one of Arteta’s key players – Martin Ødegaard – is back to full fitness and in form; he created a match-high four chances in the 1-0 win at Everton last time out.
In fact, among players to play 500+ minutes in the Premier League this season, only Manchester City’s Jérémy Doku (3.4) and Rayan Cherki (3.2) have created more open-play chances than Odegaard’s 2.5 per 90 minutes.
Brighton know what they’ll be up against and so will be grateful for any positives heading into the game. Boosting them will be the returns of Diego Gomez and captain Lewis Dunk from suspension, but Jan Paul van Hecke and former Arsenal man Danny Welbeck face late fitness tests after struggling with illness and a lower back injury, respectively.
Arsenal v Brighton Head-to-Head
Brighton may be winless in their last four Premier League games against Arsenal, with two draws and losses apiece, but they did come from behind to draw 1-1 in both meetings last season.
This fixture came just three weeks into the 2024–25 season after Arsenal won their previous two matches. Following Kai Havertz’s opener for the Gunners late in the first half, a controversial red for Declan Rice in the second resulted in João Pedro netting Brighton’s equaliser just before the hour mark.
The reverse fixture at the Amex fell four days into the new year, and once again saw João Pedro rescue a point for Brighton.
Arsenal v Brighton Prediction
Although they only squeezed past Everton by the narrowest of margins last weekend, the Opta supercomputer rates Arsenal as heavy favourites to extend their winning run against Brighton.
Across 10,000 pre-match simulations, Arsenal came away victorious 69.5% of the time. Brighton won just 13.4% of the simulations, with a draw seen as a likelier outcome at 17.1%.
Arsenal v Brighton Predicted Lineups
Arsenal: David Raya, Jurrien Timber, William Saliba, Piero Hincapie, Riccardo Calafiori, Martin Odegaard, Martin Zubimendi, Declan Rice, Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Jesus, Gabriel Martinelli.
Head coach: Mikel Arteta
Brighton & Hove Albion: Bart Verbruggen, Joel Veltman, Lewis Dunk, Olivier Boscagli, Ferdi Kadioglu, Yasin Ayari, Diego Gomez; Charalampos Kostoulas, Brajan Gruda, Kaoru Mitoma, Georginio Rutter.
Head coach: Fabian Hürzeler
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system. They assign an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams. This score is on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
Ahead of kick-off at the Emirates on Saturday, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides. …
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Arsenal vs Brighton Prediction: Will Gunners’ Grip on Top Spot Be Tested? Opta Analyst.
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