Arsenal vs Southampton Prediction | Opta Analyst

Arsenal are huge favourites to continue their fine start to the season on Saturday. We look ahead to their Premier League game at the Emirates Stadium with our Arsenal vs Southampton prediction and preview.

Arsenal vs Southampton Stats: The Key Insights

• The Opta supercomputer makes Arsenal strong favourites to beat winless Southampton at the Emirates Stadium, giving the Gunners a 78.5% chance of victory.
• Southampton’s 24 Premier League away games against Arsenal are the most one side has played against another without winning in the competition (eight draws, 16 losses).
• Kai Havertz has scored in four home league games in a row. The last player to score in five successive home league matches for Arsenal was Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang in September 2019.

Two stoppage-time goals spared Arsenal’s blushes against Leicester City in a 4-2 victory last time out in the Premier League, with the Gunners retaining one of just two unbeaten records in the division, alongside Manchester City. They will be supremely confident of preserving that status on Saturday when winless Southampton visit the Emirates Stadium.

A Wilfred Ndidi own goal and a Kai Havertz strike handed Arsenal victory on Matchday 6 after a James Justin double had cancelled out first-half strikes from Gabriel Martinelli and Leandro Trossard. With Paris Saint-Germain vanquished by a 2-0 scoreline in the UEFA Champions League in midweek, Mikel Arteta’s men are now targeting three home victories in seven days.

Another win would see Arsenal bring up 400 home victories in the Premier League, with only Manchester United (428) having previously reached that landmark. Meanwhile, only four sides have ever suffered more away defeats in the competition than Southampton’s 246.

One player who has particularly enjoyed turning out at the Emirates lately is Havertz, who netted against PSG on Tuesday and has also scored six goals in his last six league games at the ground. He has netted in four successive home Premier League games, with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang the last player to score in five straight for the Gunners in the competition, doing so in September 2019.

Having already defeated Leicester this term, Arsenal are now unbeaten in their last 40 Premier League home games against promoted clubs, winning 35 and drawing five since a 1-0 loss to Newcastle United in November 2010. Only Chelsea (43 between 2001 and 2015) and Man City (41 between 2007 and 2020) have had longer such runs in the competition’s history.

Arsenal remain without several players for Saturday’s game, with Martin Ødegaard, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Takehiro Tomiyasu not expected to return until after the international break. Defenders Ben White and Jurriën Timber, meanwhile, are doubts.

Southampton face a daunting task as they chase their first victory since promotion from the Championship, having suffered a comprehensive 3-1 defeat to neighbours Bournemouth on Monday. Russell Martin’s Saints have just one point from their first six games of 2024-25, making this their joint-worst start to any league campaign (also one point in the top flight in 1998-99).

Across 2024-25 and their relegation season in 2022-23, Southampton are now winless in 19 Premier League matches, drawing five and losing 14. Only once in their top-flight history have they endured a longer such run, going 20 games without a victory between August and December 1969.

If they are to leave the Emirates with a result, they may be left relying on a face familiar to Arsenal fans in Aaron Ramsdale. The former Gunners shot-stopper could become the ninth goalkeeper to face Arsenal in the Premier League after previously representing them in the competition.

Only one of the previous eight, Aston Villa’s Emiliano Martínez, has kept a clean sheet in his first such match, doing so in a 3-0 victory at the Emirates in November 2020.

It is at the other end of the pitch where Martin’s men have really struggled, only scoring three goals from a figure of 7.7 expected goals (xG). Only Manchester United (five goals from 10.6 xG) have underperformed their underlying figures by a greater margin this term, while Southampton’s shot conversion rate of 4.4% is the worst in the Premier League.

Ben Brereton Díaz is one of the forwards hoping to rectify that, and Monday’s match at Bournemouth saw him reach 20 Premier League appearances without a single victory (five draws, 15 defeats), the most of any player in the history of the competition.

Southampton will be without captain Jack Stephens after he was handed an extra two-match suspension following his comments to the officials after his red card in Saints’ recent defeat to Man Utd, but Will Smallbone could return after recovering from a thigh injury.

Arsenal vs Southampton Head-to-Head

Southampton have actually caused Arsenal problems lately, going unbeaten through the teams’ last three Premier League meetings (one win, two draws), with both of their matches in 2022-23 finishing level – including a 3-3 draw at the Emirates.

However, Saints have visited Arsenal 24 times in the Premier League without ever tasting victory, drawing eight times and losing 16. That is the most any team has visited another in the competition without winning.

Arsenal are unbeaten in their last 28 home league games against Southampton since a 1-0 defeat in November 1987. Only against Fulham (a current run of 31) have they had a longer unbeaten home run in their league history.

Southampton have also struggled more widely in London, losing 82 of their 139 Premier League trips to the capital (59%), the highest loss rate of any of the 12 sides to have played 100 or more away games there. Indeed, only Everton (91) and Newcastle (89) have lost more overall than Saints.

Arsenal vs Southampton Prediction

It will come as no surprise to learn that Arsenal are heavy favourites for Saturday’s game, winning 78.5% of the Opta supercomputer’s pre-match simulations.

Southampton are assigned just an 8.7% chance of victory, with 12.8% of simulations finishing level.

In our season predictions, Arsenal are given an 18.1% chance of winning the title to Man City’s 72.1%, finishing second in a league-high 45% of projections. Southampton, meanwhile, are relegated in 89.9% of simulations, by far the highest probability in the division.

Arsenal vs Southampton Predicted Lineups

Opta Power Rankings

The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system that assigns an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.

Ahead of kick-off this weekend, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.

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