After a 16-day wait, we’re finally back in action again when Fulham cross the capital for a game under the Emirates Stadium lights on Tuesday (7.45pm UK), as the 2024/25 Premier League season enters its final straight.
Having edged past their west London rivals Chelsea in our last outing, we’ll hope to similarly send the Cottagers back home without three points to their name yet again. In 32 previous meetings in N5 in all competitions, we have never lost to Fulham, the most we’ve faced a side without ever tasting defeat on home soil.
But this year’s vintage are heading to us dreaming of a first-ever top-six finish. Having won three of their last four on their travels and being unbeaten against us in our last three encounters, Marco Silva’s side will be confident they can finally end the longest search for a win at a specific venue in English league history.
Read more Tickets available for Fulham Premier League clash
Ful-steam ahead of Silva
With nine games to go, Fulham are right in the hunt for a first return to European football since 2011/12. They sit in eighth spot, but just four points behind Chelsea in fourth, thanks to winning five of their last eight Premier League games.
The Thameside outfit have steadily collected points throughout the campaign, only suffering successive defeats once in the league all term, and that was back in October. They’ve only been beaten four times in their last 17 matches, and have lost just two of their last 10 away games in the league, however one of those did come on their last trip when they fell 2-1 to Brighton.
They bounced back from that by beating Tottenham Hotspur 2-0 before the break, but saw their dreams of clinching a first piece of major silverware go up in smoke when they were beaten 3-0 by Crystal Palace at home in the FA Cup quarter-final on Saturday. Silva will be hoping that cup exit doesn’t sidetrack his side from beating their best-ever league finish of seventh in 2008/09.
What the managers say
Arteta: "We had a good time to reflect and to reset and put ourselves in a really good position to go for the most exciting part of the season.
"They're always a really tough opposition, a team that is very well coached. They've been together for many years, they have great organisation, a lot of individual quality and a very clear identity of how they play, how they want to approach the games, especially against us. So we're going to have to be really good tomorrow to beat them."
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Silva: “They had all the time to prepare the game from the last international break, [and] that is going to be against us. They have this small advantage, plus the home game is always different than you play away from home, but we know their quality, we know their intensity, their physicality as well - they're probably one of the more physical teams in the league.
“They are going to create some problems for us, but we have to be brave enough to play our game, face them and match them, because there are three points there to fight for, and they are going to demand many, many things from ourselves."
Team news
Mikel Arteta confirmed that Bukayo Saka is available again after three months following his recovery from hamstring surgery.
Riccardo Calafiori returned early from international duty after suffering an injury at the end of Italy’s loss against Germany, and is set to be out for a few weeks, but fellow full-back Jurrien Timber should be OK after sitting out both of the Netherlands’ matches through illness. Kai Havertz (hamstring), Takehiro Tomiyasu and Gabriel Jesus (both knee) remain on the sidelines.
Read more Injury updates on Saka, Calafiori and Timber
Harry Wilson has been out since February after fracturing his foot, while Kenny Tete has been missing since before Christmas with a knee injury but did return to light training before the international break.
Reiss Nelson is ineligible to play against us, but is out for the season after undergoing hamstring surgery in February. He had scored twice in 12 appearances before his campaign ended prematurely in December.
Taking tactics
Adrian Clarke, writing in the official matchday programme: Silva’s success has been built around a 4-2-3-1 shape that sees Fulham play a brand of neat and tidy possession football. This is their domination formation, but recently he has flirted with a back three, especially in away matches, but in their last league game when they comfortably beat Spurs, Silva went back to his tried and trusted back four.Most weeks the Cottagers play in an attacking manner, looking to build attacks by passing through the thirds. They are a side that love to funnel the ball wide, before whipping dangerous crosses into the box. Fulham’s overlapping full-backs are a key part of their armoury in this department. Tonight, we may see a more pragmatic approach as in our previous meeting in December, Silva set his side up to sit very deep and play on the counter. They troubled us with long balls from back to front and always posed a threat when they broke at speed.Fulham are superb down the flanks, producing far more open-play crosses than any other top-flight team, mainly thanks to left-back Antonee Robinson, Adama Traore and former Gunner Alex Iwobi. As a by-product, Silva’s side are a threat in the air. Raul Jimenez and Rodrigo Muniz pose danger in that regard, and we must also look out for late runs from former Arsenal favourite Emile Smith Rowe, who has scored twice from headers.Outside of that core strength, Fulham are strong in their duels, excellent at moving the ball around, and creative inside the final third. They also keep teams at arm’s length, very well indeed - with an expected goals against tally of just 33.43, they rank third, behind ourselves and Liverpool. However, Fulham have also let several promising leads slip away, winning just nine of the 18 matches where they scored the opening goal.
Facts and stats
We have never lost a home Premier League game against Fulham (P17 W11 D6) with only ourselves against Southampton (25) facing a side more often on home soil in the competition without ever tasting defeat.
Fulham are unbeaten in their last three Premier League games against us, only once having a longer such run without defeat (four between May 2011 and November 2012).
The Cottagers have won three of their last four league matches, having only won three of their first 10 on the road this season.
We have earned 20 points in league London derbies this season, more than any other side. Fulham, meanwhile, have won four; only in 1931/32, 1947/48, and 2000/01 (all 5) have they won more in a single campaign in their Football League history.
Fulham have had 13 goals scored by substitutes in the Premier League this season (excl. own goals); only four sides have ever had more in a single campaign in the competition: Newcastle in 2023/24 (14), Arsenal in 2009/10 (15), Man City in 2011/12 (15), and Liverpool in 2015/16 (15).
Rodrigo Muniz has scored five goals as a sub in the Premier League this season, the most by a Fulham player in a single campaign in the competition.
We have restricted our opponents to less than 0.50 xG in 11 of our 29 Premier League games – at least three more times than any other side has managed. Seven teams have had their lowest xG in a league match against us this term, including Fulham in December (0.16).
No player has made more interceptions in the Premier League this season than Antonee Robinson (50, level with Ryan Gravenberch), while the left-back has also made a league-high 344 off-the-ball runs into the final third.
Of Mikel Merino’s six Premier League goals, five have given his side the lead in a match, while he has scored the winning goal in four of the five Premier League games in which he has scored.
Raul Jimenez has scored in each of his last two appearances against us.
Match officials
After presiding over Newcastle United’s League Cup triumph in his last outing, John Brooks has been given his third Gunners game this season, which both also saw the Geordies claim wins at our expense.
A 3-0 success at Brighton last term was the only time we’ve won under his watch in four matches; the same amount as Fulham, whose sole victory in a game Brooks refereed came in the Championship in 2019. Brooks issues 5.5 cards per game, the most of any regularly-used referee in the division this term, although he is yet to send a player off in 13 Premier League matches.
Referee: John BrooksAssistants: Simon Bennett, Dan RobathanFourth official: Oliver LangfordVAR: Andy MadleyAssistant VAR: Constantine Hatzidakis
Previous visits from Fulham
The Cottagers’ last trip to Emirates Stadium came in August 2023 when Joao Paulinha netted a late equaliser to claim a 2-2 draw. That was after we had recovered from falling behind in the first minute from Andreas Pereira thanks to strikes from Bukayo Saka and Eddie Nketiah, and the visitors having Calvin Bassey sent off.
12 months earlier, Gabriel recovered from allowing Aleksandr Mitrovic to open the scoring by firing home a late winner to record a 2-1 success, with Martin Odegaard also on target. The previous encounter came in April 2021 when a late Nketiah strike cancelled out a Josh Maja penalty to deny Fulham their first-ever win in N5.
Read more From the vault: Five famous wins against Fulham
Live coverage
With this game not being televised in the UK, the best build-up can be found on Live from N5 - right here on Arsenal.com and the official app!
Join us at Emirates Stadium from an hour before kick-off when Nicole Holliday and Theo Walcott will be joined by former Gunner Mathieu Flamini to preview the game, as well as next week's Champions League visit of Real Madrid.Frimmy and Jeremie Aladiere are pitchside to bring you live warm-ups, while Declan Rice gives us his Top Three, plus Theo ranks his top five Arsenal goals - with the help of our studio audience!Singer-songwriter Mark Ambor drops by the studio, and we'll announce the winner of Arsenal in the Community's inaugural Kevin Campbell Award before Dan Roebuck and Adrian Clarke provide live commentary of the game - make sure you tune in!
You can also find out which broadcasters are showing the action live wherever you are in the world
Read more How to watch Arsenal v Fulham live on TV
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