Arsenal opened the way to the English Premier League title in front of its chaser and defending champion Manchester City, after wasting a two-goal lead against its host West Ham, to settle for a 2-2 draw Sunday in the thirty-first stage competitions.

The Gunners advanced early with the goals of Brazilian Gabriel Jesus (7) and the Norwegian Martin Odegaard (10), before the homeowners responded via Algerian international Saeed Ben Rahma (33 from a penalty kick) and Jared Bowen (54), noting that the guests missed the opportunity to advance 3-1 when Bukayo Saka missed a penalty kick in the 52nd minute.

Arsenal was required to win and collect the three points the day after Manchester City beat Leicester City 3-1 on Saturday, narrowing the difference to only 3 points.

And now Arsenal have 74 points, compared to 70 for City, who has a postponed match, and hosts the Gunners at home on the 26th of this month, in a match that may be fateful to determine the identity of the champion.
After the match, Spanish coach Mikel Arteta said, "We started in a very good way. We scored two beautiful goals. After that, we made a huge mistake by not playing with the goal of scoring the third and fourth."

"We thought we could play around that and keep the score. We gave them hope."

And after he led for most of the season and seemed on his way to achieving his first league title since 2004, it seems that Arsenal began to pay the price for his stumbling in three consecutive matches last February, when he suffered two losses and a draw.

After that, he did not taste the loss in his last nine matches in the league, achieving 7 consecutive victories against two draws, the first against Liverpool 2-2 in the last stage when he also missed a two-goal lead and Sunday against West Ham, noting that the last loss of the “gunners” dates back to February 15. February in front of City 1-3 at the Emirates Stadium.

For its part, West Ham is still struggling not to drop, as it is 4 points ahead of the eighteenth Nottingham Forest.
And it seemed that Arsenal would achieve a landslide victory over its host after scoring two goals 10 minutes after the start whistle, beginning with Jesus after a team game. The ball reached Odegaard, who turned it into Ben White, to pass it cross in front of the goal, which the Brazilian followed in the goal, in his ninth goal this season after moving to Arsenal from City.

And Odegaard turned from a passer into a scorer after a new team game and cross from Martinelli to the single Norwegian, to finish with a shot on the fly with his left foot (10).

West Ham refused to surrender, taking advantage of a fatal mistake by Partey, who lost the ball in front of the penalty area under pressure from Declan Rice, to reach the Brazilian Lucas Paqueta inside the area, and the latter was subjected to a mistake by his compatriot, defender Gabriel Magalish, so that the referee awarded a penalty kick after confirming the video assistant referee “VA R" Benrahma successfully executed it against goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale (33).

Arsenal had the opportunity to double the lead again early in the second half, after being awarded a penalty kick after a handball on Mikael Antonio, but Saka executed it in a bad way, shooting to the right of the goal (52).

West Ham waited only two minutes to punish its London rivals, and equalized the score when German Thilo Kehrer lifted a ball behind the defenders, which Bowen followed on the low jumper in the bottom left corner (54).

Manchester United rose to third place with its third successive victory in the league, which came at the expense of its host Nottingham Forest 2-0, taking advantage of Newcastle’s loss 3-0 against its host Aston Villa on Saturday, to advance it by 3 points.

The goals of the Red Devils were scored by Brazilian Anthony (32) and Portuguese Diogo Dalot (76), who scored his first goals in the league with Manchester United since his arrival in the summer of 2018.

This is United's fourth victory over Nottingham this season, with a total score of 10-0 (back and forth in the League and the League Cup semi-finals).
United entered the match after a setback on Thursday, when it squandered a 2-0 lead at home against Sevilla, Spain, in the first leg of the European League quarter-finals, "Europa League", to tie 2-2 with two reverse goals in the last six minutes.

He also lost in the match the efforts of his Argentine international defender, Lisandro Martinez, until the end of the season, after suffering a metatarsal fracture, and his French colleague, Rafael Varane, for "a few weeks."

The match witnessed the return of Brazilian Casemiro to local competitions after he was suspended for four matches after being sent off for the second time this season during the tie against Southampton, so he missed three league matches and one in the local cup.

And after it was announced that the Austrian Marcel Sabeters - who scored two goals against Seville - was in the starting line-up, he suffered an injury in the warm-up, and Dane Christian Eriksen replaced him.

And in the absence of his injured top scorer, Marcus Rashford, United opened the scoring when Frenchman Anthony Martial killed the ball from the opponent to reach Portuguese Bruno Fernandez. He returned it to the Frenchman inside the area. He shot it and saved it from Costa Rican goalkeeper Keylor Navas, to prepare for Anthony, who followed it into the net (32).
And after Navas managed to keep his team in the match atmosphere with wonderful saves, Dalot doubled the lead after Anthony made a distinguished individual effort and beautiful dribbles, before passing a through ball to the Portuguese into the area, which he settled into the net (76).

United will miss the league competition next week because it is busy in the cup semi-final against Brighton at Wembley Stadium, to return to the league hosted by Tottenham on the 27th of this month.
The stage competitions will end on Monday, with Liverpool Al-Jarij meeting with its host, Leeds United.