Arsenal’s recent struggles continued as they were beaten 1-0 by West Ham at home this weekend as they battle on without any recognised No 9. Their title bid looks increasingly unlikely after falling 11 points behind Liverpool
Arsenal’s rollercoaster season has continued after their dismal 1-0 loss to West Ham on Saturday, leaving their title bid in tatters.
The Gunners are 11 points adrift of Liverpool with a game in hand, but hope that the team can pull that lead back are diminishing by the day.
Mikel Arteta will be forced to play the rest of the campaign without a recognised No 9 after losing Kai Havertz and Gabriel Jesus to season-ending injuries and is struggling to get any consistency out of his team with so many key players missing.
Mirror Football has picked out some of the biggest news and gossip relating to Arsenal in the wake of their defeat to the Hammers.
Piers slams Arsenal
An Arsenal defeat is never complete without a hammering from their most high-profile supporter Piers Morgan.
The Gunners’ disappointing 1-0 home defeat to West Ham has put a massive dent in their title aspirations, with Liverpool now 11 points clear of them at the top of the Premier League table.
Arsenal still have a game in hand to play, but it still appears unlikely Mikel Arteta’s men will be able to catch the Reds, who look unflappable at present and underlined their strengths by brushing aside Manchester City 2-0 at the Etihad.
The team really struggled without a recognised striker up front, as Arteta’s experiment of playing Mikel Merino as a forward this time failed after scoring a brace against Leicester. Morgan believes Arteta is to blame for their lack of options in attack, claiming he “refused” to sign a new striker and said the club had gone backwards.
“Dear Mikel Arteta… we’re now going backwards under your tenure because of your bizarre refusal to sign a world class striker,” he wrote in a scathing post on X .
He also included pictures of a host of Arsenal’s top strikers from recent seasons, including Dennis Bergkamp, Ian Wright, Robin van Persie, Thierry Henry and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
“To help focus your mind, we need one with the calibre of these guys below,” he added. “So, for God’s sake stop being so damn stubborn and get us one.”
PSV sign ex-Gunners forward
Arsenal’s lack of a recognised No 9 will be even more glaring in bizarre circumstances when they come up against PSV on March 4, with a former Arsenal forward joining the Dutch side on a free transfer.
PSV have signed ex-Gunner Lucas Perez on a short-term deal until the end of the season after his contract at Deportivo La Coruna was cancelled by mutual consent. The 36-year-old comes from the Spanish second division, where he has scored four and assisted another four this season.
He joins PSV’s existing options Luuk de Jong and Ricardo Pepi and bolsters their squad for the rest of the season. Perez will now be set for a reunion with Arsenal when they lock horns in the Champions League last-16 next week.
The Spaniard joined Arsenal from Deportivo for around £17m in 2016 but was a major transfer flop as he only scored one Premier League goal in 11 appearances before being loaned back to his old employers.
He later joined West Ham for one season before spells with Alaves, Elche, Cadiz and then eventually ended up back at Deportivo. Last season he was playing in the third tier of Spanish football and scored 12 times to help the club win promotion back to the Segunda Division.
There might be a few fans wondering if they could have given Perez a go given he was available for free and their current options look ill-suited to finish the season successfully.
Arsenal given potential title nightmare
If you were a betting man, placing your chips on Arsenal to win the title this season would be a bad move given their current predicament.
Liverpool look nailed on to secure their first Premier League title since 2020 this season after securing a huge lead that looks difficult to overcome.
Even if the Reds do end up dropping points from now until May, Arsenal will have to hope Liverpool lose more than three games while Arsenal will likely have to win most of their remaining games – all without a striker.
Arsenal do play Liverpool but not until May in the third-last game of the campaign, and the title could be practically done and dusted by that point.
Arteta’s men have 12 games to play with their game in hand. Winning all them would hand them 89 points.
However, Liverpool can reach 97 points if they win their remaining 11 matches and there is a very real possibility that their title triumph could be clinched before they meet on May 10.
That means the Gunners could be faced with the agonising possibility of giving their rivals a lap of honour before that game.
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