Premier League title race: Arsenal are sitting pretty as title rivals Manchester City and Aston Villa falter

Villa retreated after suffering their second consecutive defeat at home, this time against Brentford, while Manchester City showed a kind of negligence, complacency and a soft midfield that represents a serious weakness when they wasted a 2-0 lead over Tottenham Hotspur to get only one point.

If the cheers inside Tottenham Hotspur’s vast stadium were deafening when Dominic Solanke equalized with his side’s scorpion kick 20 minutes from time, they were perhaps louder four miles away in Arsenal’s part of north London.

“We played a really good game overall. In the 70th minute, they put more balls in behind, more players there, more players in the middle to attack more directly,” Guardiola told BBC Sport.

“They scored a goal and we knew what happened and then they had the momentum. The Premier League is like that. We had our momentum again at the end.

“It’s a setback but we’re still there and moving forward. There are still 14 games left and a lot of points. We’ll see.”

Antoine Simenho, who scored City’s second goal, was also defiant as he told BBC Sport: “The way we set it up was to keep them out a little bit. It worked perfectly in the first half. I had another chance before my goal. I’m kicking myself but we have to go ahead again.”

He added, “A win would have definitely helped us, but it’s not over yet. There are 14 matches remaining, so anything can happen.”

Guardiola is still angry and frustrated with City’s control of the first half by two goals, but he somehow managed to waste two points and almost lost the three points.

Tottenham showed their determination to come back and equalize, but City was the reason behind their downfall after losing control of coach Thomas Frank’s team, which won only two home matches in the league out of 12 this season.

On this evidence, and even against these rivals, this flawed City have shown that they can be hacked and undermined in a way that gives no confidence that they will be able to fix Arsenal.

This was the first time City had led by more than two goals at half-time in a match but had failed to win since April 2018 (3-2 defeat to Manchester United). They have won each of the last 115 occasions when they were ahead by more than two goals at half-time in all competitions.

Emery has always played down Villa’s title aspirations as part of managing expectations, but they were only in the conversation over those home losses to Everton and then Brentford perhaps to confirm his belief that his side were always contenders for long shots.