Arsenal vs. Manchester Utd - Premier League Soccer Betting Odds

The Premier League season rolls on this weekend as teams go into their fourth gameweek. The biggest fixture of the weekend is Sunday afternoon’s matchup pitting Arsenal against Manchester United at Arsenal’s London home, the Emirates.

Both teams are in the pack that continues to chase Manchester City at the top of the table. It’s one of the most historically significant fixtures of the Premier League schedule, and this time hosts Arsenal come in as the moneyline favorites on most online betting sites.

Arsenal vs. Manchester United Premier League Soccer Betting Odds - September 3rd

This matchup is one of England’s oldest and most storied rivalries, dating all the way back to 1894 and covering a whopping 238 matchups. Both teams made major moves in the summer to improve their chances of staying in the top four while also pushing towards the levels at which Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City teams have been playing for the past half-decade. All odds provided by Sports Interaction.

This isn’t the Masters, but it is a tradition like no other. Arsenal vs. Manchester United doesn’t have quite the cache that it had when they were the two best teams in England fighting for the title year in and year out, but they’re still two of the top clubs in the English Premier League—and there is certainly no love lost between the teams and fans.

Through three weeks, Arsenal have two wins and one draw, leaving them 5th in the table. They played well in a 2-1 opening day triumph against Nottingham Forest, though they did allow a late consolation goal. They were also victorious 1-0 away to Crystal Palace, which is always a tough fixture. Last week they drew 2-2 to bottom feeders Fulham in a very erratic performance.

Manchester United, for their part, have won two matches and lost one so far, which puts them 8th in the table. They won their opening match 1-0 over Wolves in a very dubious manner, then they were thoroughly beaten by a resurgent Tottenham squad before bouncing back last week with a whacky come-from-behind victory during which they went down 2-0 in the fourth minute.

The defense of United has been very dodgy so far in this campaign, allowing 5.2 xG through three matches, ninth highest in the Premier League. Their attack on the other hand, which is focused largely on quick transitions on the counter, has produced the third most xG, with 7.1.

Arsenal, meanwhile, has been very solid at the back despite a lot of moving parts, allowing just 2.7 xG so far while only managing 6.0 xG themselves. This is a battle of two teams in flux, as Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta and Manchester United’s Erik Ten Hag both attempt to figure out how to get their new additions to mesh.

Ten Hag has been playing his best player, Marcus Rashford, out of position through the middle because their shiny new striker is not yet fit, which has cut into his production. On the Arsenal side, Arteta has a lot of guys playing out of position so as to fit Kai Havertz into the team. Whichever one makes the right adjustment first will have the upper hand in this match.

Given that both teams have squads that have not yet found their chemistry, this could be a very open match, which is what the last four meetings between these sides have been: all have seen at least four goals or more. Arsenal seems like they’re waiting to burst offensively, so we like the total goals over 3.5 prop at +129 odds.

It’s also worth noting that while these teams usually trade wins, they do so based on which team is playing in front of their home crowds. Consider this: the home team has not lost in 10 of the last 11 Premier League fixtures between these clubs. In fact, Manchester United has not won a Premier League match at the Emirates since 2017, a span of five straight games. With that in mind, we like Arsenal to squeak this one out at -133 odds.

We’re expecting goals aplenty in this match, so at least a few of these options are likely to hit on Sunday. Depending on which one starts atop Arsenal’s attack, Gabriel Jesus and Eddie Nketiah are both great bets to score at +165 odds, though Nketiah is the better option as he’s in better form and scored twice last time the Red Devils came to the Emirates.

If Marcus Rashford plays off the wing, he’s also a great bet to score as he showed last season that when he plays with width, he’s one of the most dangerous players in the league. And at +245, the odds don’t get much better.