Arsenal and Mikel Arteta have been told the crazy set of circumstances it would take for them to usurp Liverpool at the summit of the Premier League standings.
The Gunners head into the weekend's battle with Manchester United a whopping 13 points adrift of Arne Slot's Reds, who can temporarily go 16 clear with an expected win over basement side Southampton on Saturday.
Arsenal may have slaughtered PSV Eindhoven 7-1 in their midweek Champions League contest, but they have failed to score in successive Premier League games with West Ham United and Nottingham Forest amid their attacking injury crisis.
Without all of Kai Havertz, Gabriel Jesus, Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli, the consensus is that Arsenal lack the firepower needed to overhaul Liverpool, whose wing wizard Mohamed Salah is on track for the greatest individual Premier League season of all time in terms of combined goals and assists.
Speaking exclusively to Sports Mole, ex-Arsenal striker Jeremie Aliadiere claimed that the Gunners would need to win four or five in a row and hope for Liverpool to lose four or five in a row to overhaul Slot's side, a fanatical scenario he cannot see unfolding.
Aliadiere: 'Arsenal can't really win four in a row'
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"Until mathematically it is impossible, you always hope," the Frenchman said. "But realistically, you'll have to have Liverpool losing four or five games on the bounce, and we can't really win four or five games on the bounce. So, that's pretty difficult.
"It looks very hard to achieve. But at the same time, you just feel like you've got to play every game the same way you go. You can't really pick and choose in terms of 'well, now let's not play the Premier League, let's focus on the Champions League.'
"You've got the top four, you want to at least finish second. If you can't win it, you've got to finish as highest as possible. You don't want the team behind you catching up, and then you end up having to fight to finish in that top four.
"You've got to carry on playing games. You've got to do everything you can to try to go as far as possible and win it if possible."
Could Aliadiere's crazy scenario come true?
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According to Aliadiere, Arsenal would need to do something that they have not managed to do once this season to win the title, as the Gunners are yet to win four on the spin in the 2024-25 top-flight campaign.
Arteta's men have had three different streaks of three successive wins in the top flight, but they have not enjoyed more straight victories in one season since winning their last six matches of the 2023-24 campaign.
The Gunners' next two games versus Man United and Chelsea will be far from straightforward, as will their first two games of April against Fulham and Everton, which precede three winnable matches against Brentford, Ipswich Town and Crystal Palace.
However, Bournemouth at home should not be so straightforward for Arteta's men, while it is difficult to picture Liverpool losing all four of their toughest remaining fixtures with Tottenham Hotspur (April 27), Chelsea (May 3), Arsenal (May 10) and Brighton & Hove Albion (May 18).
As Slot's side have now gone 24 games unbeaten in the top flight and have lost just once in the league all season long, the Gunners may very well end up giving a guard of honour to the Reds at Anfield in two months' time.
Jeremie Aliadiere was speaking to Sports Mole on behalf of William Hill.
Ben Knapton
