Man City keep up pace in title race, Arsenal go fourth

LONDON : Manchester City opened up a four-point lead in the Premier League title race by thrashing Watford 5-1 and Arsenal seized the initiative in the battle for fourth spot on Saturday.

Brazilian Gabriel Jesus scored four goals as City applied pressure on chasing Liverpool ahead of their Merseyside derby on Sunday against struggling Everton.

Watford, meanwhile, suffered a fourth successive league defeat as their hopes of staying up receded.

Arsenal followed up their midweek win at Chelsea with a 3-1 home defeat of Manchester United to move into fourth place, ahead of Tottenham Hotspur who could only draw 0-0 away to Brentford in the day's late kickoff.

Nuno Tavares struck early for Arsenal with Bukayo Saka doubling their lead from the penalty spot.

A sluggish United finally woke up with Cristiano Ronaldo sweeping in Nemanja Matic's cross and they squandered a chance to level when Bruno Fernandes hit the post from the penalty spot before Granit Xhaka made sure of the points for the hosts with a 70th-minute thunderbolt.

"It's a big performance in a game that had everything. We created chances, we had to suffer, there were moments when we lacked energy and they were on top, we were efficient in the boxes, we had luck," Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta said.

"This is going to be a rollercoaster - today it went in our favour."

The win took Arsenal into fourth spot, two points above Tottenham Hotspur who were lacklustre in a stalemate at Brentford for whom Ivan Toney was twice denied by the woodwork.

Sixth-placed Manchester United, who announced earlier this week that Erik ten Hag would become their new manager, suffered a fourth successive away defeat in the league and their chances of qualifying for the Champions League are dwindling.

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