Well a quarter of the season has officially gone by and it might be a cliché but it does look like one of the most open Premier League seasons for a long time.

Chelsea lost to Aston Villa yesterday, Liverpool lost to an in-form Sunderland, Manchester United were extremely lucky (again) at home and Arsenal cruised past Birmingham City.

So United are top, Chelsea second and Arsenal fourth, although we are only 4 points off top spot with a game in hand.

Here are my thoughts on the ‘top sides’ and what this means for Arsenal:

Manchester United

From where I’m standing, Manchester United have been extremely lucky at home this season. It borders on the ridiculous.

They have played five home games, won four and drawn one. Every win has come from a solitary goal and everyone one of those games was very fortuitous. And you can even say that for the game they drew.

Against Birmingham, they won 1-0 but Birmingham shaved the post and hit the bar. Then we have the Arsenal game, where Almunia and Diaby literally threw away the points and United somehow got all three despite Arsenal dominating the majority of the match. They beat Manchester City with a 97th minute winner and the same injury-time rule applied when Rio Ferdinand’s retarded younger brother decided to score an own goal to claim a draw against Sunderland.

And yesterday, Bolton had enough chances to steal a point in the closing minutes but Cahill and Knight’s headed opportunities were wasted.

United fans will argue that a sign of champions is the ability to win matches they don’t play well in and to grind out results, but you would have to believe that the longer the season goes on teams will realise that if you attack United at Old Trafford then you can get something. Manchester City and Bolton in particular were very negative but still could have got something – and you wonder what would have happened if they took the game to the home side. City only attacked once they went a goal down, and Bolton when they were two goals down.

They may be top at the moment, but there are definitely weaknesses in that side. With Ronaldo they had that aura of invincibility but without him they struggle to establish a settled midfield line-up. If they do end up winning the league come May then the other top sides should be ashamed.

Chelsea

Well they had a sensational start to the season.

They won their first six games and looked in cruise-control but since then they’ve lost 2 games from 3, losing to Wigan and Villa away, and beating Liverpool in between.

Under Ancelotti they do seem to be playing much better football. The two fullbacks have license to attack and they play two up top with Drogba and Anelka, and Drogba in particular is in great form with 7 goals already this season. And unfortunately for the rest of the league, he seems to be focused on scoring goals and (bar a lapse against Liverpool) cutting out his histrionics.

Chelsea do seem to have a slight weakness from set-pieces though, with both of their defeats including unmarked players (who happen to be opposing centre-backs) scoring free headers. Encouraging for the free-scoring Gallas and Vermaelen when Arsenal meet Chelsea on November 29th.

Objectively though, you could say that against Villa they were pretty unlucky because they had more than enough chances to equalise and probably win the game.

And where have we heard that before?

Liverpool

What can you say about the Merseysiders?

It’s hard to take their title-challenge seriously – not because they don’t have the ability – but just because it’s so long since they won it. There’s no doubt they are a top quality team but when it comes to a long 38 game season they just seem to come up short every time.

They lost Xabi Alonso to Real Madrid in the summer and with Lucas they just haven’t found a suitable replacement. There’s the old adage that they rely far too much on Gerrard and Torres and while it’s too easy to agree with that you’d have to say it’s true. Torres and Gerrard were both missing and they had nothing to offer against Sunderland.

On thing that bugs me about Liverpool is Rafa Benitez. Is he the only manager in the entire league who doesn’t celebrate a goal? When Liverpool score, he looks down in his notepad and writes something down. He’s like a headmaster or something.

Manchester City

Well based on their sheer buying power this season, you have to consider them a top side now, even if you don’t want to.

They’ve only lost one game this year, and that was against a fortunate United side. They’ve had 3 big tests this season, and they beat Arsenal, put in an excellent performance at Old Trafford (without Adebayor) and drew against Aston Villa. They have so much attacking talent so they will always be a threat. Defensively they are much improved with Toure and Lescott, although the latter is taking time to settle, and they have Shay Given who is a top class goalkeeper.

If you want to nick-pick Micah Richards at right-back can sometimes be a liability but with the personnel in their side they have more than enough to brush aside the majority of the lower sides in the league. Another big advantage they have is that they don’t have the distraction of Europe this season.

And with the top sides like Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea losing games already they will believe that it is an open title race.

The big question is like Liverpool, do City have the mentality to go on and win the league and can they handle the pressure at the business end of the season. It is new territory for both the players and manager so it will be very interesting to see how they cope come March, April and May.

And finally, Arsenal…

The summer brought in a few major changes, the biggest being the new 4-3-3 formation, the addition of Thomas Vermaelen from Ajax and the departure of Kolo and Adebayor to Manchester Citeh.

Thomas Vermaelen has been sensational this year, and on top of being a brilliant defender he’s scored a lot of important goals already this season. He’s a threat from set-pieces (which is a great addition to our style of play) and adds some steel to the team. And his determination is fantastic and can only be a positive influence on the squad.

The formation change was subject to a lot discussion and debate and I was surprised more than anyone when it was actually used this season. Wenger’s been using 4-4-2 ever since he came to the club so it was a bit of a shock. But to his credit, Arsene’s willingness to change things looks like to have worked.

We’re not in top gear right now, but despite our rocky form in Manchester we’ve won every other game, have a flawless record at home and scored a record number of goals, apparently.

I also have to mention the form of Alex Song this year. He has really impressed me and along with Denilson has really stepped up his game. Unfortunately, Denilson is injured for a while and Diaby is his replacement. I’m not convinced about Diaby (as regular readers will know) but hopefully Nasri’s impending return might help the situation. Arsene could also play Rosicky in that role as well – at least he makes an attempt to tackle.

There’s no doubt we can unlock any defence but it’s our defensive frailties which will be the biggest factor in whether we win anything this season. With our attacking talent our goal-scoring record speaks for itself but we are sometimes prone to make mistakes at vital times. Almunia and Diaby were quite frankly idiotic against Manchester United, in a game we threw away the points – the big question is can this Arsenal team take the pressure? Old Trafford is a fortress and when questions were asked of Arsenal we crumbled. Our performances at Stamford Bridge and Anfield this season will be a measure of what this Arsenal squad can achieve this season.

The encouraging thing is though that despite already racking up two defeats this season, we are only 4 points off United with a game in hand. So hopefully there’s more to come once we’ve got everyone back fit and we’re at the top of our game.

There’s certainly a lot to be optimistic about this season, for a lot of different reasons.

2 defeats in 4 games leaves Arsenal in a strange position.

The start of to the campaign couldn’t have been better. A fantastic 6-1 win at Goodison Park really did surprise a lot of people. We thrashed Portsmouth 4-1 a week later and in between the two Premier League games we managed to beat Celtic away, something which teams like AC Milan, Manchester United and Barcelona had failed to do in recent seasons.

And I was particularly excited about the currently squad.

Vermaelen was clearly a brilliant signing. Hungry, quick and great in the air – the Celtic game really showed us what he was all about. This guy was obviously a winner and his determination and ability were hugely impressive. Another great signing by Arsene Wenger.

But with that, it seemed that two of his young protégés were now ready to step up to the mark.

Denilson and Song looked a lot more mature and composed in midfield. Alex Song in particular has looked a far better player this season and his tackling ability has really impressed me, and along with Vermaelen has been one of our best players so far for me.

But the confidence and winning start to the season came crumbling down at Old Trafford, and again at The Eastlands.

I didn’t write after the Manchester United game because I was livid. Nothing I would have wrote would have made any sense, although in fairness I suppose you could argue that I’ve never made sense anyway.

But I was livid for so many reasons.

We were the better team by far but we had let United off the hook, big time. We should have inflicted them with their second defeat in the Premier League and emphasised our intent for the season but a combination of bad luck, quite frankly shocking refereeing and stupidity from our own team threw all the hard work away.

Remember, we were dominating the Champions at their own ground and United were so worried about our attacking threat they actually played 5 in midfield. At home!

After taking the lead into half-time with a wonder goal from Arshavin, we dominated the first 10 minutes of the second half – which culminated in THAT Robin Van Persie chance which for all intents and purposes would have finished the game as a contest. United were not a threat at all but with only a solitary goals advantage a single mistake would change the game completely.

And unfortunately, we had two.

Rooney was charging down (away from the goal) in the penalty area and for some strange reason Almunia decided to take out the fat scouser. It was a ridiculous decision from an experienced goalkeeper who should know better. United had nothing and to gift them a penalty was unforgivable and I still get angry about that. Yes, Rooney started to fall before contact was made but why give him an excuse to fall to ground? This is Wayne Rooney we’re talking about here. Pure idiocy plain and simple.

As you would expect, Rooney dispatched the penalty and the game completely changed. You don’t give a team like Manchester United any sort of encouragement and as expected the goal rejuvenated them and then another moment of stupidity gifted them the winning goal.

I know my criticism of players in the past has probably been over-critical but I honestly don’t know why Abou Diaby plays for Arsenal. I was cursing his performance well before he stupidly headed in that own goal because he is such a lazy player. And I was even more infuriated when he stayed on the pitch as Denilson, Eboue and Arshavin were substituted. This guy has no big game intelligence and might be good against whipping boys like Portsmouth but doesn’t have the desire and drive to be top class.

He’s been around longer than players like Denilson and Song but for me, Diaby never looks like improving. I’ve said this for years now and my opinion hasn’t changed one bit. He is a liability and the problem is these mistakes keep happening time and time again. I honestly wonder how Wenger has so much patience with the guy. If you thought Adebayor was a lazy player, Diaby takes the biscuit. There’s no doubt he has some ability, but unfortunately we only see it when he’s bothered – which quite honestly isn’t enough.

And we have to mention the refereeing, because it was disgraceful. We should have been awarded two penalties (on Van Persie and Arshavin) in the space of 2 minutes but nothing was given. And I couldn’t believe how many fouls Valencia got away with in the first half without even getting booked. Evra did get book eventually but it took around 1,274 fouls before his name was in the book. And of course, Arsenal picked up 6 bookings to United’s 2 even though the home side produced a lot more fouls over the 90 minutes.

We all know about the disgusting songs aimed at Arsene at Old Trafford too, and the ridiculous sending off so I won’t go over old ground again.

Then we come to the Manchester City game.

I always look to see who the referee is before an Arsenal game, and funnily enough I was confident when I saw Mark Clattenburg’s name come up. I’ve always thought he was a decent referee, but not yesterday.

I only caught some German highlights yesterday and obviously it only showed the major incidents, so excuse me if I am incorrect in my interpretation of the game.

What I saw wasn’t a white-wash from Citeh.

Their opener came from a lucky Almunia own-goal. Can you blame the Spaniard for the goal? Who knows. People have said that he didn’t shuffle his legs over enough and others just put it down to back luck. And it looked like Micah Richards was offside (not unlike Gallas was for our disallowed equaliser at Old Trafford). When it rains, it definitely pours.

Manuel Almunia hasn’t had the best start to the season, and has only kept one clean sheet in 6 games so far which was against Celtic at Parkhead. And to be fair, Gallas and Vermaelen were immense that day and he didn’t have many saves to make. The problem is should a top-class keeper be conceding so many goals for a side like Arsenal?

The second half saw Tomas Rosicky’s introduction and it seemed like his presence gave Arsenal the charge they needed, and Robin Van Persie scored an excellent goal after turning Lescott (not for the first time this season) and drilling the ball into the bottom corner with his weaker foot.

From what I saw from the coverage, the reason Arsenal lost was partly because they were unlucky and partly because they were hell bent on going for the win. And our attitude to never give up and always score is one of the reasons why were are were we are.

That’s not a criticism, but an observation.

It looked like Arsenal had a hell of a lot more chances than City did. Van Persie came close several times, including a shot which hit the post. Gallas had a header cleared off the line and Shay Given (as you would expect) showed his quality and was called to make several top drawer saves.

On the balance of play, a 4-2 defeat is pretty harsh.

But now to the encouraging news.

Yes, we’ve lost 2 games in 4 and in seasons gone by, I would be the first to criticise the team for a lack of effort, heart and desire. But that doesn’t seem the case this season.

The biggest problem I’ve had with Arsenal teams that have lost games (remember Fulham and Hull last season) was the lack of desire. I couldn’t care less how much ability you have, if you didn’t give 110% when you wore an Arsenal shirt then I found that extremely annoying. Regular readers will know that I loved players like Ray Parlour because he would die in an Arsenal shirt. Obviously, I don’t really want to see our players actually dying but determination is paramount for me.

And that hasn’t been our problem this season.

If we apply the same attitude over this campaign then I won’t be worried about what the season holds for Arsenal. For me, the reasons for our defeats have been down to a combination of bad luck, and the desire to win.

Leading 1-0 at Old Trafford, if we closed the game out we probably could have left with all 3 points. Even at 1-1, when we gifted them a goal we probably could have left with a point. But that’s not in our nature, and unfortunately we were punished for it.

It was the same story in the blue half of Manchester. We pegged it back to 1-1 but got caught on the counter-attack trying to score the winner. In both games, at the vital times we were on top but then got hit with a sucker punch. Don’t get me wrong, along with the back luck we have to eliminate the stupid individual mistakes from players like Diaby and Almunia, but we’re not a million miles away from everyone else.