Arsenal legend Paul Merson has emphatically ruled his former club out of this season’s Premier League title race after Saturday’s 1-0 home defeat by West Ham.
The result left the Gunners eight points behind table-toppers Liverpool with 12 rounds of fixtures remaining.
Liverpool will travel to Manchester City on Sunday but, speaking on Sky Sports, Merson claimed that even a 7-0 defeat for the leaders would not be enough to reignite Arsenal’s hopes of winning the title.
An attacking injury crisis saw Gabriel Jesus, Kai Havertz, Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli all miss Saturday’s game at the Emirates Stadium.
In their absence, Gunners boss Mikel Arteta started midfielder Mikel Merino as a makeshift centre forward, with Leandro Trossard and 17-year-old Ethan Nwaneri either side of him.
Merino was given the nod up front after scoring two late goals in a 2-0 win at Leicester seven days earlier.
Arsenal lost 1-0 at home to West Ham United in the Premier League on Saturday afternoon
Saturday’s result further strengthened Liverpool’s position in the Premier League title race
Paul Merson says that leaders Liverpool now have a ‘1,000,000%’ chance of winning the title
But Merson said: ‘They were fortunate last week, let’s be honest. It was 0-0, they made Leicester look half-decent last week and Merino then comes on and scores two very good goals. It’s a hard position to play, centre forward.
‘There’s not a lot of top centre-forwards around. It’s a difficult position to play, and to just throw people up there and expect they’re going to do the magic, especially when they’ve never played there, is, for me, mind-blowing really. Absolutely mind-blowing.
‘He looked like a fish up a tree. I don’t mean to be disrespectful to him. He’s a holding midfield player. It’s like me going and playing at centre half. I mean, you just don’t do that. It’s like Clinton [Morrison] going and playing right back. You know what I mean? You just can’t do that. So, yeah, I worry for Arsenal now. I worry for them now.’
Asked if he thought that the title race was now over, he replied: ‘One million per cent. One million per cent. There’s no way Arsenal can catch Liverpool. They’ve got no forwards. They’ve got no forwards.
‘They’ve got a young 17-year-old who’s going to have a bright future, an amazing player. He struggled today, but he’s 17 years of age.
‘Trossard is a bit-part player, in my opinion. I think if everybody’s fit, he’s one of them you want to come on with 30 minutes to go if you need him. I think he’s that kind of player, but he’s got to play every game now, and then they’ve got no centre forward. There’s absolutely no chance.
‘Even if Liverpool got beat 7-0 tomorrow, they still can’t win the league. They can’t. I saw enough today to know that they are going to struggle to the end of the season.
‘How many games have they got left? They’ll do well to win half.’
Merson said of Merino: ‘He looked like a fish up a tree. I don’t mean to be disrespectful to him’
Liverpool have only lost one league game all season – a shock 1-0 defeat by Nottingham Forest at Anfield in September.
Meanwhile, Saturday’s slip-up against West Ham was Arsenal’s third league loss of the campaign.
The Gunners have also drawn more games than the Reds.
Of Liverpool’s 12 remaining league matches, seven are at home and only five away.
Arsenal have six left at home and six on the road, including a trip to Anfield on May 10.
