Impressive displays against Manchester City and Liverpool in the first half of the season has made the Gunners many people’s favourites to become English champions in May. However, question marks continue to lurk over the north Londoners.
Arsenal haven’t won the title since 2004 and are rivalling two clubs who have enjoyed success in recent years. Many have continued to back City to retain the title, with Liverpool also chasing their tail.
Neville, who has previously backed Arsenal to win the league, has claimed that Arteta’s combination of attackers will cost them. Gabriel Jesus, Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli are the three first-choice forwards – scoring a combined 19 goals this season.
“At Arsenal is an emerging front three that could be great. But they don’t combine a lot together,” he said on the Gary Neville Podcast.
“That’s a real problem, the best front threes involve their centre-forwards and the wide players, they play and bounce it off them.
“You see in years gone by, Salah, Firmino and Mane would link between the three of them. At Manchester United, when we were at our best, the front two would link between them.
“It is difficult for defenders to deal with them when front players link. Martinelli, Jesus and Saka, I don’t see them linking up a lot.
“I don’t see Liverpool making a move in that position in January because they’ve got Diogo Jota and plenty of players up there. It’s more Arsenal.
“I’ve been talking at the end of many of their games this season about whether Gabriel Jesus or Eddie Nketiah are No 1 and No 2 strikers in Premier League title-winning sides. Or whether they are actually No 2 and No 3 strikers and they need that No 1.”
Jamie Carragher’s assessment of Arsenal’s attacker was on the same wave length as Neville, claiming Jesus has to add more goals to his game.
“When you have someone like Jesus at the top end of the pitch, you need to have someone like Mohamed Salah or your goalscorer out wide. He [Jesus] is almost Roberto Firmino-like in that his job wasn’t to score goals,” he said.
“When you look at Arsenal’s front three and put them together, there’s not really enough goals there. They need someone to be a Mo Salah or a Sadio Mane so there’s no-one to notice Firmino’s lack of goals.
“Believe it or not, the season where Liverpool won the title in 2020, Firmino didn’t score a goal at Anfield in the league. That is unbelievable for a team winning the title. But Jesus, we look at him because there’s not those amount of goals coming from the wide areas.
“I look at Arsenal and parts of Liverpool and go: can they win the league with deficiencies in certain areas? You look at Arsenal and you think can you win the title with a lack of a goalscorer every week who is going to be getting a goal or close to getting one?”