All of the ‘big six’ sides – Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham, Liverpool, Manchester City and Manchester United – have all played one another at least once so far in the 2025-26 Premier League season, but who rules the roost in the major headline clashes?
The results might surprise you.
Liverpool had the best record in these games last season, stepping up on the big occasion, a key reason for their title triumph as they did the league double over Manchester City and held chasers Arsenal to draws home and away.
It was only after securing the title with a resounding 5-1 victory over Tottenham that Arne Slot’s Reds finally lost a game to ‘big six’ opposition, losing 3-1 away to Chelsea after a week of celebrations.
Normal service appeared to be resumed as they won their first five outings of the 2025-26 Premier League campaign, including a hard-fought 1-0 victory over Arsenal.
But things took a swift and dramatic turn from there, with subsequent defeats to Chelsea, Manchester United and Manchester City (alongside further shock defeats to Crystal Palace, Brentford and Nottingham Forest).
They showed their pedigree in a hard-fought goalless draw in the return fixture against Arsenal, but their earlier wobbles leave them miles off retaining their Premier League crown.
Arsenal’s narrow defeat at Anfield, thanks to Dominik Szoboszlai’s long-range free-kick, brought an end to their long unbeaten record in such ‘big six’ fixtures.
Before that, they’d gone 22 matches without defeat (13 wins, nine draws) in the league against their fellow ‘big six’, including a 1-0 victory away to Manchester United on the opening weekend of this season.
It’s been something of a reversal since then, with Mikel Arteta’s Gunners mounting an imperious title challenge by regularly notching routine wins over the rest of the league, while dropping further points against Liverpool, Manchester City and Chelsea.
Surprisingly enough, both Manchester City and Arsenal have an almost identical – and fairly underwhelming – record in the ‘big six’ clashes this season. The top two have each only won two of seven such games in the league in 2025-26 so far.
Arsenal’s six-point lead over chasers City is more down to their ability to grind out results more consistently against teams lower down the table.
It’s been something of the inverse for Manchester United, who have registered statement victories over Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester City – the latter two in Michael Carrick’s first two games at the helm – but are a long way off a title challenge due to their failure to dispatch teams in the bottom half of the table under Ruben Amorim.
It’s a stark difference to last season, when the Red Devils had the worst record in the ‘big six’ mini league, having mustered just one win from the 10 matches in 2024-25.
Chelsea have a mixed but relatively decent record in their ‘big six’ outings so far this season, with their 10-man defeat at Old Trafford their only defeat in such matches so far.
But they’ve only played half of those matches to date – with Liam Rosenior having return fixtures against United, City, Spurs, Liverpool and Arsenal to come in a tough run-in.
Tottenham, meanwhile, have the worst record, averaging less than a point per game in such matches, but they have taken four points from City this season – once again proving Pep Guardiola’s bogey team.
Here’s how the ‘big six’ head-to-head table stacks up in full so far in 2025-26, with each team placed in order of their points-per-game:
1. Manchester United
Played: 7
Won: 4
Drawn: 1
Lost: 2
Goals For: 11
Goals Against: 10
Goal difference: +1
Points: 13
Points Per Game: 1.86
2. Chelsea
Played: 5
Won: 2
Drawn: 2
Lost: 1
Goals For: 6
Goals Against: 5
Goal difference: +1
Points: 8
Points Per Game: 1.60
3. Manchester City
Played: 7
Won: 2
Drawn: 3
Lost: 2
Goals For: 10
Goals Against: 8
Goal difference: +2
Points: 9
Points Per Game: 1.28
4. Arsenal
Played: 7
Won: 2
Drawn: 3
Lost: 2
Goals For: 9
Goals Against: 7
Goal difference: +2
Points: 9
Points Per Game: 1.28
5. Liverpool
Played: 6
Won: 2
Drawn: 1
Lost: 3
Goals For: 5
Goals Against: 8
Goal difference: -3
Points: 7
Points Per Game: 1.17
6. Tottenham
Played: 6
Won: 1
Drawn: 2
Lost: 3
Goals For: 8
Goals Against: 11
Goal difference: -3
Points: 5
Points Per Game: 0.83
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