Premier League top-four race: Is it between Arsenal and Spurs?

With Manchester City and Liverpool fighting for the title and Chelsea on course to finish third, Man Utd, West Ham, Arsenal and Tottenham look set to battle it out for a top-four finish.

As it stands, there are eight points dividing fourth-placed Arsenal and eighth-placed Wolves, setting up what looks to be an intriguing race to qualify for next season’s Champions League.

Here, we assess the runners and riders in the battle for fourth, their form and their fixtures until the end of the season…

The table…

The fixtures…

Arsenal

Position: 4th
Games played: 28
Points: 54
Top-four Sky Bet odds: 1/2
Active cup competitions: None

Arsenal endured a torrid opening to the campaign, losing their first three matches to suffer their worst start to a season in 67 years. They were rock bottom of the Premier League with Mikel Arteta under pressure, but the Spaniard has overseen a remarkable recovery at the Emirates Stadium.

Saturday’s 1-0 victory over Aston Villa saw the Gunners claim a 10th Premier League victory in 13 games to consolidate fourth place and strengthen their grip on Champions League qualification. Arsenal have conceded just eight goals in that 13-game period.

Gary Neville has explained his recent comment that he didn’t “fully trust” them and said he now expects Arteta’s side to clinch fourth place despite some tricky fixtures still to come.

“The reason I said that you can’t fully trust Arsenal is because they’ve not delivered yet,” Neville said on Monday Night Football recently.

“The pressure is now on them, in the sense that there is now an expectation that they will finish fourth.

“I think they will finish fourth, but they’ve got Tottenham still to come, they’ve got Manchester United to play.

“Now they have got to go on and prove that we can all trust them, that they can go and deliver Champions League football, which was against all expectations at the start of the season.”

Key fixtures: Brighton (H) – Saturday April 9; kick-off 3pm, Chelsea (A) – Wednesday April 20; kick-off 7.45pm – live on Sky Sports, Manchester United (H) – Saturday April 23; kick-off 12.30pm, West Ham (A) – Sunday May 1; kick-off 4.30pm – live on Sky Sports, Tottenham (A) – TBC

Tottenham

Position: 5th
Games played: 29
Points: 51
Top-four Sky Bet odds: 9/4
Active cup competitions: None

Tottenham had alternated between wins and losses in each of their last seven games but were able to post back-to-back Premier League wins for the first time in 2022 with victory over West Ham before the international break.

Defender Eric Dier feels there has been a clear progression in performances.

“I can’t hide that the run has been weighing on my mind, it has been weighing on all of our minds, and to end that now before the international break is really important for us,” he said.

“I think despite the results you can see that we have really improved a lot in the last couple of months, even if you look at the Man Utd game and the Burnley game, they weren’t the results we wanted but I think they were different performances to what you have seen before.”

Key fixtures: Brighton (H) – Saturday Apr 16; kick-off 12.30pm, Leicester (H) – Saturday Apr 30; kick-off 3pm, Liverpool (A) – Saturday May 7; kick-off 3pm, Arsenal (H) – TBC

Manchester United

Position: 6th
Games played: 29
Points: 50
Top-four Sky Bet odds: 11/2
Active cup competitions: None

United will end a fifth successive season without a trophy as the club find themselves at yet another crossroads. Hopes of lifting the Champions League always looked faint and their failure to land a glove on Atletico Madrid saw them meekly tumble out at the round-of-16 stage.

Having finished as Premier League runners-up and lost the Europa League final on penalties, hope of further progress under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was fuelled by the summer acquisitions of Jadon Sancho, Raphael Varane and Cristiano Ronaldo.

But they were out of the Carabao Cup in September then humbled on home soil by Liverpool and Manchester City, with the 4-1 loss at Watford leading to Solskjaer’s exit in November. Interim boss Ralf Rangnick has only lost two Premier League games but there have been too many draws and disjointed displays, plus they are out of the FA Cup and Champions League.

The club have now won just two Champions League knockout matches in the last decade – a period in which their gross transfer spend is reported to be GBP1.4billion. United currently look unlikely to even qualify for next year’s competition as Rangnick’s Jekyll and Hyde outfit fifth in the standings, four points behind an Arsenal side that boast a game in hand.

The fact a club of United’s stature went for an interim appointment in November says everything about the long-term planning at a club whose interest in Ajax’s Erik ten Hag and Paris Saint-Germain boss Mauricio Pochettino is well documented. Thomas Tuchel’s name has also been mentioned since issues at Chelsea began to brew.

Football director John Murtough and technical director Darren Fletcher want to make an appointment before the summer to provide a foundation to build on. Unless performances improve, the club could even slip into the Europa Conference League or miss out on European football for the first time since they finished seventh in 2013/14.

Key fixtures: Leicester (H) – Saturday April 2; kick-off 5.30pm – live on Sky Sports, Liverpool (A) – Tuesday April 19; kick-off 8pm – live on Sky Sports, Arsenal (A) – Saturday April 23; kick-off 12.30pm, Chelsea (H) – Sunday May 15; kick-off 3pm.

West Ham

Position: 7th
Games played: 30
Points: 48
Top-four Sky Bet odds: 50/1
Active cup competitions: Europa League

West Ham had a fantastic start to the season. Under David Moyes, the Hammers were flying high and looked real contenders for the top four. Despite wins at home against Liverpool and Chelsea though, they suffered a bit of a blip with back-to-back defeats to Wolves and Man City in November before successive defeats to Arsenal and Southampton in December.

They responded well, though, and wins against Watford, Crystal Palace and Norwich put them firmly back in the race for Champions League qualification. But defeat to Manchester United on January 22 saw them concede fourth place on a weekend in which Arsenal dropped points and Tottenham lost to Chelsea.

A narrow win over Watford got them back on track, but subsequent draws against Leicester and Newcastle saw their top-four bid stutter before they rounded off February with an important three points at home to fellow European challengers Wolves.

Defeat at Tottenham before the international break came at the end of what Moyes described as a “good week” for the club, having sealed progression to the Europa League quarter-finals. That could be their best route into next season’s Champions League now.

West Ham’s run-in to the season looks tricky, with trips to Chelsea and Brighton to come. They also face Arsenal and Man City at home. If they are going to reach the top four, West Ham will have to do it the hard way.

Key fixtures: Chelsea (A) – Sunday April 24; kick-off 2pm – live on Sky Sports, Arsenal (H) – Sunday May 1; kick-off 4.30pm – live on Sky Sports, Man City (H) – Sunday May 15; kick-off 3pm, Brighton (A) – Sunday May 22, kick-off 4pm.

Wolves

Position: 8th
Games played: 30
Points: 46
Top-four Sky Bet odds: 500/1
Active cup competitions: None

Wolves had a rocky opening to the season with three successive 1-0 losses under new manager Bruno Lage that left them 18th in the league. One of those losses came against Nuno Espirito Santo’s Tottenham, who had left last season to take charge of the north London club.

However, Lage has since overseen an improvement in his side’s form with impressive victories against Aston Villa, West Ham and Brighton. Though they are the third-lowest scoring team in the division with 24 Premier League goals, their defensive nous has been a key component of their rise up the table. They have conceded just 21 times this season, a record that is bettered only by Man City, Liverpool and Chelsea.

Their start to 2022 was impressive, with successive victories over Manchester United, Southampton and Brentford.

Home and away defeats to Arsenal were setbacks, but they did immediately respond to the loss at Molineux to the Gunners with key victories over Tottenham and Leicester which kept Wolves firmly in the hunt for European qualification.

The Midlands club were back on track from successive wins over Watford and Everton – but Friday night’s dramatic 3-2 home defeat to Leeds means it is now looking increasingly likely that a Europa League berth is the limit of their aspirations.

Lage said after the Leeds loss: “We play the way we need to play at home. We controlled the game from the first minute, we dominated in everything. We know Leeds is strong to press, but we controlled and managed the ball.

“We created a lot of chances and could have scored more goals. We need to grow up. We needed to kill the game.

“For 45 minutes with the good football, maybe the best I saw from us this season. Goals and opportunities and I’m proud of my players.”

Key fixtures: Brighton (H) – Saturday April 30; kick-off 3pm; Chelsea (A) – Saturday May 7; kick-off 3pm; Liverpool (A) – Sunday May 22; kick-off 4pm; Man City (H) – TBC

Watch the race for Champions League qualification unfold live on Sky Sports.