Advantage Liverpool - but Arsenal aren't about to bottle this title race: Winners and losers as Gunners come out fighting to hold off Erling Haaland and Man City

Phil Foden and Haaland were the stars of City's last great result at the Etihad Stadium when they dismantled Manchester United, but they met a very different type of opponent in Arsenal and barely made an impact.

Haaland was shackled by Gabriel while Jorginho kept his eye on Foden, ensuring the midfielder could not dictate the pace of the game as he usually does. Pep Guardiola is one of Foden's biggest admirers, so it shows how badly he was playing that he hauled City's homegrown hero off the pitch after an hour in favour of Jack Grealish, who outshone his team-mate. On this evidence, Grealish could be a better option to start against Aston Villa on Wednesday than Foden, who also had a miserable time with England.

It is rarely a good idea to write off Haaland, meanwhile, but his record in big matches is getting hard to ignore, as he has only scored one goal against top-five opponents this season.

Jurgen Klopp's side must have been dismayed after losing to Manchester United in the FA Cup in their last outing, but they might have accepted that painful elimination had they known that two weeks later they would be sitting two points clear at the top of the Premier League table.

Liverpool had typically made life difficult for themselves earlier in the day by conceding in just the second minute against Brighton, but thanks to some Mohamed Salah magic they turned the game around to win 2-1.

They could catch up with events in Manchester while on their way home from Anfield, and will be delighted with the result, which leaves them back in control of the title race and without having to face Arsenal or City in their final nine games. They have a favourable run-in too, with Tottenham looking like their hardest home game left, and Manchester United and Aston Villa their toughest away opponents.

After having pretty good fortunes with injuries in defence, all the dominos had started to fall in the build-up to the most important stage of the campaign for City. And they continued to do so on Sunday as Nathan Ake pulled up injured midway through the first half, forcing Guardiola to throw on the still inexperienced Rico Lewis while switching Manuel Akanji to centre-back.

Ake being out would not usually set alarm bells ringing, but his injury comes at the worst time, with Guardiola already missing three key players at the back. Ederson got injured at the start of the month at Anfield and then City suffered a double whammy of blows in the international break. The usually bulletproof Kyle Walker hurt his hamstring for England against Brazil and then John Stones, playing for the Three Lions against Belgium, suffered yet another setback in an injury-riddled campaign.

The losses come as City have six games in the next three weeks, including their Champions League quarter-final clash with Real Madrid, the FA Cup semi-final with Chelsea and a testing league fixture with Aston Villa on Wednesday.

It is no secret that City saw Arteta as Guardiola's eventual successor, and they were distraught when he left his role as the Catalan's assistant coach to take charge of Arsenal in December 2019. The Spaniard inherited a huge task when he succeeded Unai Emery and he has had to take the long road to reach this point, but he has never been closer to overhauling his old master and his old employers.

Arsenal may not end up winning this title in the end. but whatever happens in the final game, he has done away with his side's reputations as City's pushovers. At the start of this season, the Gunners had lost 12 consecutive Premier League games against City between 2017 and 2023 and had not beaten them since 2015. Now,they have avoided defeat in their last two fixtures.

Arsenal's title bid effectively fizzled out last season when they were thrashed 4-1 at the Etihad, but 11 months on they came here as equals and left with a draw that keeps them above City and with Liverpool within reach. Just as crucially, they left with their heads held high and still believing they can topple these two juggernauts.

"You want to win the game. You prepare to win it. If you cannot win it, make sure you draw it. We did that," Arteta said. "Eleven months ago we were here and the story was very different. You have to make steps as a team and today we’ve done that."

If City do make history and become the first team to win four consecutive English league titles, it will be down to their ability to beat the ordinary sides and not their biggest rivals. That's because Guardiola's side have taken just four points out of a potential 18 against top-five opponents in the Premier League this season while failing to beat any of them. City have drawn home and away with Liverpool, lost and drawn with Arsenal while losing at Aston Villa and drawing at home to Tottenham.

Their poor form in the crunch games is in stark contrast to last season, when they took 16 points from a potential 24 against top-five opponents, including doing the double on Arsenal, their closest rivals.

Guardiola said City had performed well in most of these matches apart from at Arsenal and Villa, but could not argue with the results. "The numbers are there," he said. "Against the top six, Villa away was the worst. The rest we’ve played really well. I have to analyse the performance. If you say four points compared to 16 then it’s a big difference."

Arsenal have so often lost to City due to their physical frailty, but here they stood tall and brought the battle to their hosts. And no one stood out more than Gabriel, who walked all over Haaland. The Brazilian barely gave his opponent room to breathe and made the 6'4 striker look small and weak. Gabriel won every challenge with the league's top scorer and cut out every cross City put into the box.

But defenders do not keep clean sheets on their own, and the tireless Jorginho also played a crucial role in ensuring City drew a blank. On their previous visit to the Etihad Stadium, Arsenal had conceded four goals, while in their preceding trip here they had shipped five. So the fact that they left with a clean sheet shows how much they have improved defensively within the last year.

Arsenal's resilience meant City failed to score at the Etihad in a Premier League game for the first time since October 2021. The Gunners also became only the third team to keep two clean sheets against Guardiola's City in the same season.

"It’s extremely difficult to do that," said Arteta. "It shows you the commitment of every player, the discipline they showed and how they compete, One thing is to play a football match and another one is to compete in it. Today we did that really well."

They say that defences win titles, and if Arsenal do end up lifting a first Premier League crown in 20 years, it will be down to their steely backline, which was embodied by the warrior spirit of Gabriel.

When Arteta was asked to sum up the match, he said "It was a thrilling game." He must be the only person of the 55,000 in the stadium and the millions watching worldwide who thought so.

The top-of-the-table showdown should have capped an unforgettable feast of Premier League action this weekend, but instead it was a damp squib and miserably failed to live up to its billing. There was a flat atmosphere before kick-off, which was a big surprise given the occasion, and it continued for much of the game, which was high on fouls but low on skill or goalmouth action. There were just three shots on target in the 90 minutes, and neither David Raya nor Stefan Ortega had to stretch to make a save.

The drab nature of this top-of-the-table showdown was particularly disappointing given the feast of football Premier League fans had been served up over the past 24 hours or so. The previous nine games had yielded 32 goals, with nine of them coming within the final 10 minutes or in added time.

Newcastle’s epic 4-3 win over West Ham was the pick of the bunch, but there was late drama all around the country with big ramifications at both ends of the table, confirming the competition’s status as the best league in the world. City-Arsenal should have capped an unforgettable weekend, but instead it threatened to put a dampener on it.

The match mirrored the insipid fixture at the Emirates Stadium earlier in the season, and neutrals will be crossing their fingers that the two teams do not meet again in the Champions League semi-finals, and that either Bayern Munich or Real Madrid will prevail in their respective quarter-finals instead.