Lee Dixon: Inconsistent Arsenal to sneak past Liverpool

 

Two big clubs are chasing Champions League positions and one will surely miss out says Lee Dixon as he looks at this huge midweek fixture in the Premier League...

 

It's really hard to work Arsenal out this season. Just as they appear to pull it together everything falls apart with a dismal result.

 

Inconsistent sums up my old team and the same can be said for Liverpool in Brendan Rodgers' first season at the helm.

 

The visitors go to The Emirates on the back of one of their worst results in a campaign that has featured a few shockers. While Arsenal flirted with disaster at  Brighton in the FA Cup last weekend, Liverpool fell head over heels with that 3-2 defeat at Oldham.

 

That came as a major surprise as the Reds had been in good form prior to the Oldham match - winning without conceding in matches against Norwich and Sunderland, with  that 2-1 defeat at Old Trafford coming in between.

 

Given both teams' inconsistency, predicting the result is a tricky task but the Betfair market makes Arsenal slight favourites and I agree. I fancy them to edge a  tight encounter, but suspect they may just be held so rather than back the win, I will plump for a pair of scorelines - a 2-1 Arsenal win and the 1-1 stalemate - as I  certainly see both teams scoring.

 

Recent results point to a home win or draw with Opta telling us that six of the last 11 matches between the two finishing ending in a draw and four in Arsenal  victories. That should give the Gunners confidence, but as we have seen it is a commodity that's in short supply at The Emirates.

 

It's a far cry from my days at the club. Back then the emphasis was on consistency and producing the same level of performance week-in, week-out and even if we put in  a bad display we had the character to dig out results and that kept the confidence up. It's not something that's happening at the moment and these poor results just  obliterate momentum and belief. The same goes for Liverpool of course.

 

Both teams are locked in a battle for the Champions League places, but I wouldn't backing either of them for a top-four finish. In fact, I wouldn't put my money on any  of the four teams in the hunt. The market has Tottenham as favourites and rightly so, but they usually find a way to fall off the pace - would you really want to back  Spurs at 2.14 with 15 games to go? Everton (7.4) look light, while we have already touched on the weaknesses at Arsenal (2.32) and Liverpool (8.0).

 

A Wednesday win for either would be a huge boost for their European hopes. I suspect it'll be Arsenal who take the three points, but in this season nothing would  surprise me once the 90 minutes is up!

 

Recommended Bets

Back both teams to score @ 1.6

Back 1-1 @ 8.0, 2-1 @ 10.5

 

Bet HERE

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