Nigel Winterburn: "Arsenal Have the Strongest Team in the League ... but the Title Race is on a Knife Edge!"

Nigel Winterburn: "Arsenal Have the Strongest Team in the League ... but the Title Race is on a Knife Edge!"

After Arsenal’s surprise home defeat to Manchester United last weekend, all any football fan can talk about is the Premier League title race. Will Arsenal throw it away once again? Or will they show a new-found maturity and character to hold off their rivals for their first league title since 2004?

With 15 games still to play for the Gunners’, there are countless possibilities, outcomes and likelihoods that no one can endorse with any amount of certainty, but Arsenal legend Nigel Winterburn believes that Arsenal have a head start over the likes of Manchester City and Aston Villa.

Speaking to Football Park courtesy of Betwright, FA Cup, First Division and Premier League winner Winterburn didn’t hold back when talking about the league leaders.

“I haven’t backed down since very early in the season that this Arsenal team has the strongest squad in the league; I still believe that. Ahead of Man City, and certainly ahead of Aston Villa, but just because you have the strongest squad, it does not mean you are going to win the league.”

This Nigel Winterburn screamer at Scarborough is 32 years old today.

Feast your eyes on that fabulous playing surface. Proper carpet, that.

pic.twitter.com/wBWdSdrBH5

— A Funny Old Game (@sid_lambert) January 6, 2025

No one would dare argue with this point - boasting household names in every position, Arsenal’s squad is stacked to the brim with stars such as Declan Rice, Bukayo Saka, William Saliba and Jurrien Timber. However, they could also have been argued to have had the strongest squad in both of the last two seasons, and yet they managed to finish second both times.

Their run of runners-up finishes has led to questions over the side's mentality - do they have the capacity to slip into the mindset of serial winners? Do they have the character to swallow tough results and grind out wins when far from their best?

Winterburn is a player who knows exactly what is required to win a league title - he played 440 times for the Gunners at Highbury, and picked up two First Divisions, two FA Cups, one League Cup, and one Premier League. He knows all about the belief a team requires to win titles, and that is what he believes is missing at the Emirates Stadium.

“You’ve got to have that desire; you’ve certainly got to have the mental belief in difficult situations that you can get out of it and that you can move forward to where you want to be at the end, which is Premier League champions.”

Premier League winners of the past have always been able to churn out favourable results even in the most extreme scenarios, whether it be mounting a late climb up the table or holding off nearby rivals for months on end.

Arsenal have been in this position before - despite defeat to United, they still maintain a four-point lead at the top of the league. However, they boasted a seven-point margin at this stage last campaign and ended up 10 points astray of eventual champions Liverpool.

2 - Arsenal have only lost two games under Mikel Arteta when they've scored at least twice:

❌ 2-3 vs Michael Carrick's Manchester United in December 2021

❌ 2-3 vs Michael Carrick's Manchester United in January 2026

Repeat. pic.twitter.com/x41eDPBOGN

— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) January 26, 2026

“Arsenal are still in a brilliant position - I’d rather be four points clear than four points behind. I never get when anyone says they would rather be chasing than leading. Obviously, it was a blip. Mikel Arteta is going to have to get this team back, refocus, deliver what he needs to deliver speech-wise and prove to, not just Arsenal supporters but the rest of the world, that this is going to be their year.”

If anyone can fortify his side after a morale-shattering defeat, it is Mikel Arteta - his unique coaching style, out-of-the-box thinking and superb man management mean his players always feel like they have his full trust.

However, even the Spaniard’s meticulous, detail-orientated approach has not been enough in recent years, and with Arsenal’s repetitive trend of throwing away commanding leads, the manager himself has come under question for his management style, being accused of failing to instil that vital winning attitude.

Though he steered clear of discussing Arteta’s position at present, Winterburn did hint that there would be doubts should Arsenal throw away yet another first place for second.

Repost and piss off a rival fan ❤️ pic.twitter.com/el96tfCB4q

— Arsenal Team (@_ArsenalTeam) January 28, 2026

“This squad should be good enough to go on and win the title. If they don’t, I think then we could look and try to analyse why we think it didn’t work. Was it tactics? Was it the belief because of second-place finishes? Was it something else?”

“But when Arsenal loses a game, everyone reverts back to last season or the season before, which is natural when you’ve been in this position and think it might happen again. Will we fall away, or will we pull away from the two challengers? It would be cruel and wrong to suggest one will happen over the other, because simply we don’t know; it’s too close.”

PTSD is certainly a very real threat for Arsenal - if they drop more points in their next fixture away to Leeds, players will start to have uncomfortable flashbacks from the last two seasons, and with City and Aston Villa now close to breathing down their necks, Arteta needs to think further outside the box than ever before.

Mikel Arteta took over at Arsenal six years ago.

2026 might finally be the year his project turns into success ✅ pic.twitter.com/4r8cgMspbR

— B/R Football (@brfootball) December 20, 2025

It will take some special management to ward off the demons of his tenure at Arsenal so far.