We look ahead to Sunday’s Premier League clash at the Emirates Stadium with our Arsenal vs Man Utd prediction and preview. Can Michael Carrick’s Red Devils follow up their derby win with another shock victory?
Arsenal vs Manchester United: The Key Stats
With a 71.3% win likelihood, Arsenal are the Opta supercomputer’s big favourites, but Manchester United did pull off a surprise win over Manchester City last week. Man Utd are winless in their last six Premier League games against Arsenal (D1 L5). Arsenal’s last two Premier League games have both finished 0-0, with West Ham in December 2015 the last team to have three consecutive goalless draws.Michael Carrick could hardly have asked for a better start to his second temporary Manchester United tenure, but another difficult task awaits away to Premier League leaders Arsenal on Sunday.
The Red Devils were deserved 2-0 victors in last weekend’s Manchester derby at Old Trafford, where Manchester City were cut apart by some superb counter-attacks. The “United way”, if there is such a thing, was very much on show.
United had only 31.8% possession, yet they recorded 11 shots and hit the target with seven; City only had seven attempts in total. United’s shots amounted to 2.27 expected goals, to City’s 0.45.
Carrick’s team had three goals disallowed and hit the woodwork twice, but strikes from Bryan Mbeumo and Patrick Dorgu got them the victory their performance merited.
After facing second in the Premier League at home, Carrick’s United now head to the Emirates Stadium to take on Mikel Arteta’s leaders.
Carrick remains unbeaten as United manager (P4 W3 D1) including his three-game caretaker spell in 2021, but most importantly, the manner of their performance against City won’t have gone unnoticed by Arsenal boss Arteta.
He won’t be underestimating the challenge at hand, even if the Gunners are 15 points clear of United ahead of Sunday’s meeting. It is Arsenal vs United, after all, one of English football’s vintage rivalries.
In fact, Carrick’s first and only Premier League victory in his previous stint as United’s caretaker boss came against Arteta’s Arsenal, a 3-2 win at Old Trafford in December 2021.
However, it’s fair to say the Arsenal of 2026 are a different beast, and Arteta has generally had the upper hand in meetings with United. He has won 67% of his 12 Premier League games against them (W8 D2 L2), the highest win rate of any manager to face them at least five times.
For all of their issues, though, United do have what it takes to trouble the best teams, posting positive attacking numbers for most of the season. They rank third in the Premier League for goals (38), behind Arsenal (40) and Man City (45), second for xG (40.6), and they lead the way for shots (362) and shots on target (126).
And, although it’s a small sample size of just two games (one being vs Burnley), United rank first in the Premier League for xG (4.81), shots attempted (41), shots on target (17), xG differential (+4.12) and shot difference (+27) since Ruben Amorim’s departure.
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Arteta’s side have not faced a single shot on target in either of their last two Premier League matches, the fifth time this season they have stopped their opponents from having one. It is the most occasions a team have managed this in a single season since Chelsea in 2020-21 (five). Similarly, only Man City (in 2017-18 and 2019-20) have done so more often in a season (six in each) since at least 2003-04.
Integral to Arsenal’s defence are, of course, centre-backs Gabriel Magalhães and William Saliba.
Both of them are fit and firing, and United’s attack will have to be at their best to get the better of them.
To put Saliba’s importance into context, Arsenal have only conceded 90 goals in 118 Premier League games with the France international on the pitch, an average of one every 115 minutes. Among Gunners players to play 10,000 minutes in the competition, only Tony Adams (one every 118 minutes) has a better ratio.
If anyone can unlock the Arsenal defence, though, it’s United captain Bruno Fernandes.
He is the leading assister in the Premier League this season, having set up nine goals, and he’s created the most chances (62), too. This is despite him spending a few weeks out injured in December and early January.
The Portugal international ranks first for chances created both in open play (40) and from set-pieces (22), and his current rate of 3.4 chances created per 90 minutes is the best by a United player in a single season since Ryan Giggs in 2008-09 (3.7).
Arsenal will have to be especially aware of the threat United can pose on the break, as their brilliant win over City perfectly laid out. Fernandes is obviously influential in such instances, but the threat of Mbeumo will also have to be monitored closely. After all, only Mohamed Salah (eight) and Antoine Semenyo (six) have scored more Premier League goals from fast breaks than Mbeumo (five) since the start of last season.
But for all the attacking quality likely to be on display, there’s every chance this game – like their August meeting at Old Trafford – is decided by a set-piece. Gabriel Jesus’ second goal against Inter in midweek was Arsenal’s 19th goal from a corner in all competitions this season, the most by any side from Europe’s top five leagues, though United (13) are second only to the Gunners (14) in the Premier League for set-piece goals (excluding penalties).
Arsenal vs Manchester United Head-to-Head
Arsenal have won each of their last four Premier League home meetings with United; that’s the longest home winning run against them by any side in the top flight since West Brom between 1976 and 1980 (five).
United are winless in their last six Premier League games against Arsenal (D1 L5) – they have never gone seven successive matches without a win over the Gunners in their league history.
Arsenal are looking to complete their fifth Premier League double over United, after 1997-98, 2001-02, 2006-07 and 2023-24.
They won 1-0 at Old Trafford in the reverse fixture but have only won both league meetings with the Red Devils without conceding in 1901-02 in the second tier.
Arsenal vs Man Utd Prediction
The Opta supercomputer makes Arsenal the big favourites, winning a whopping 71.3% of the 10,000 pre-match simulations.
United are handed just a 12.3% chance of victory, while the likelihood of a draw is 16.4%.
Arsenal vs Manchester United Predicted Lineups
Arsenal: David Raya, Ben White, William Saliba, Gabriel Magalhães, Jurrien Timber, Martín Zubimendi, Declan Rice, Martin Ødegaard, Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli, Viktor Gyökeres.
Manager: Mikel Arteta
Manchester United: Senne Lammens, Diogo Dalot, Harry Maguire, Lisandro Martínez, Luke Shaw, Casemiro, Kobbie Mainoo, Amad Diallo, Bruno Fernandes, Patrick Dorgu, Bryan Mbeumo.
Head coach: Michael Carrick
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system. They assign an ability score to over 15,000 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 on Sunday at the Emirates Stadium, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.
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Arsenal vs Man Utd Prediction: Rejuvenated Red Devils Out to Disrupt Gunners’ Title March Opta Analyst.
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