Premier League: Manchester City chairman identifies match that convinced him Arsenal wouldn’t clinch the title

Manchester City Chairman, Khaldoon Al Mubarak, has claimed he believes they would win the Premier League title after losing 1-0 to Arsenal last year.

City has become the first team to win the title four times in a row.

Pep Guardiola’s side finished two points ahead of Arsenal, who had defeated City in October, before holding the champions to a 0-0 draw at the Etihad Stadium in March.

However, Al Mubarak feels that the loss at the Emirates Stadium acted as a catalyst for Guardiola’s squad.

He told City’s in-house media team: “I’ll tell you something, actually, let me ask myself the question – when did I know we were going to win the league?

“I’ll surprise you with that one – Arsenal away.

“We didn’t play particularly well. We didn’t play particularly bad. I think it was an off-game by our standards. But I don’t think we deserved to lose. If you remember, we lost with that deflected goal in the last minutes.

“I said, ‘this is why we’re going to win the league’. Today, I know how this team is going to react going forward and I know we’re going to win the league.”