Arsenal 2-2 Aston Villa: Gunners blow two-goal lead and slip up in title race as Youri Tielemans and Ollie Watkins strike to seal dramatic comeback

Different year, same old feeling for Mikel Arteta. By now he must view a home engagement with Aston Villa as something akin to a kick in the spuds.

They killed Arsenal’s title challenge in this fixture in April 2024 and the re-run here might well prove to be terminal to the efforts of 2025.

It wasn’t a defeat, so that is one note of difference, but it certainly had the echo of one for a side whose pursuit of Liverpool offered little forgiveness for slips. At six points behind, and with Arne Slot’s side holding a game in hand, Arteta will be acutely aware of what Arsenal blew along with their two-goal lead.

We should dwell on the particulars of that for a moment, because this was an implosion. A collapse. A tale of familiar shortcomings in their attack and a susceptibility to panic in their minds, underlined by the woeful marking that allowed Villa to return from the dead with two strikes in eight minutes.

A word on Villa – they stepped up well. They made it hard after being pulled from pillar to post in the course of going behind to Gabriel Martinelli and Kai Havertz goals either side of the break.

But Arsenal were so horribly flimsy once the pressure came. When they most needed to be resolute, when their season called for no more mis-steps, they instead embarked on acts of self-sabotage. The first stage of the comeback, finished wonderfully by a Youri Tielemans diving header, could be traced to weak tracking from Mikel Merino.

The second? That was a cracking volley from Ollie Watkins, but Thomas Partey’s dismal concentration gave him a free run at Matty Cash’s cross. Arteta looked furious and rightly so.

Given their injuries to Gabriel Jesus and Bukayo Saka, it is perhaps no wonder they have fallen so far behind Liverpool, but this was also the sort of day that reminded us, for the umpteenth time, that Arsenal need striking reinforcements in the January market.

They had multiple chances at 2-2 for a winner, many falling to the otherwise impressive Leandro Trossard, but none made it in, save for a Merino volley ruled out correctly for a deflection off Havertz’s elbow. Beautiful patterns and quick transitions are lovely, and Arsenal do them well, but two goals from 17 shots, many of them from strong positions, was a poor accounting.

For Unai Emery, it was further evidence that Villa’s November wobbles were a blip. They are picking up speed again and appear to have fixed their aversion to away fixtures. But Arteta will feel no such momentum.

Partly by necessity and partly by choice, he had made two changes to the 11 used in Arsenal’s neighborhood dispute with Tottenham on Wednesday, and that encompassed the absence of William Saliba.

He will need a week to manage a tight hamstring, but this was a nasty sign of what can happen when he is not in the side. To cater for his lay-off, Jurrien Timber was nudged to centre-half and Partey was repurposed as a right-back – it was nothing like as sturdy.

Villa intended to target such vulnerabilities, with Emery’s strategy hinged on a plan to feed Jacob Ramsey on the left and Ian Maatsen on the overlaps. The problem, in the initial stages at least, was that Arsenal were in no mood to share the toy.

They had early control of the game and that sense was inevitably heightened by their volume of corners, totaling four in the opening 10 minutes alone, but aside from a pair of strikes by Martinelli and Leandro Trossard, each blocked by Emiliano Martinez, it was low-yield stuff.