Wayne Rooney has warned Mikel Arteta he will be sacked if Arsenal blow the Premier League title.
Arsenal, runners-up for the past three seasons, are four points clear at the top of the table after winning seven of their opening nine league games.
A 1-0 win over Crystal Palace on Sunday saw Arsenal extend their unbeaten run to ten matches, while they have now gone five successive games without conceding.
Arsenal are not only title favourites due to their impressive form but also given the struggles of several of their title rivals.
Defending champions Liverpool have endured a shocking run under Arne Slot, losing four Premier League games in a row to slip to seventh, while Manchester City have dropped points in almost half of their games so far this season.
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Defeats to Liverpool, Man City and Chelsea over the weekend left Bournemouth, Tottenham and Sunderland in the top-four behind Arsenal.
Rooney expects Arsenal to go on and win their first Premier League title since 2004 but has warned Arteta he will likely be moved on if that fails to materialise.
Arteta, 43, was appointed as Arsenal manager in December 2019 and the FA Cup that season is the only trophy he has lifted since taking over at the Emirates Stadium.
Discussing Arsenal’s title aspirations on his BBC podcast, Rooney said: ‘They’ve got a good squad and good players. Mikel Arteta has been waiting and has been very close.
‘They’ve tallied up some very good points in some of those seasons which in other years would have been good enough to win the title.
‘Arteta has got a squad now where they’re really expected to win the league. They grind out results, they’re physical, they’ve got good attacking players, they’re so solid at the back.
‘They’ve become the favourites. They’ve been top before and not won it and that’s the pressure, can you be top of the league and stay there?
‘I think they can. The squad is good enough now and I think they’ve had the experiences which have got them close, but I think they’re ready for it, I think they’re ready to do it.
‘There’s no excuses now, there’s no excuse. If they don’t win it now, you’d probably see a change of manager.’
Arteta described Arsenal’s hard-fought victory over Crystal Palace as ‘massive’ but played down claims it made the Gunners the clear favourites to win the title.
‘A massive win,’ Arteta said. ‘We knew the difficulty of it, big credit to Crystal Palace for the way they set up. They made it really difficult for us.
‘We found a way to score against a team really well organised. We didn’t score a second goal and when you don’t do that you are in danger. They are a super difficult side. We have restricted them to very little.’
On the title race, the Gunners boss added: ‘It’s very early, we’re still in October.
‘The emotional state is really high but there are a lot of thing to get better. Let’s try and recover for Wednesday [Brighton in the Carabao Cup].’
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