"Has surprised me a little bit" - Gary Neville claims Arsenal's performances after defeat to Manchester City have 'impressed' him

Football pundit Gary Neville has expressed his surprise at Arsenal's recent recovery following their defeat to Manchester City last month. The Gunners suffered a 3-1 loss to the reigning champions, causing some doubt about their form in February.

However, they have managed to bounce back by securing victories in their last two games against Aston Villa and Leicester City.

Speaking on his show "The Overlap," Neville admitted that he thought Arsenal's chances of winning the title were over after their loss to City.

Manchester City took the top spot in the league table with the win. However, the Gunners' recent performances have proven Neville wrong as they have now established a two-point lead at the top.

The former Manchester United defender said (via TBR Football):

“I’ll confess, when City beat Arsenal on that Wednesday night, I thought (Arsenal) were done. (Arsenal) were done. City got level with you, and I thought at that point with 16 games to go, a mountain of games, they’re going to drive on."

He went on to share that the Gunners' upturn in form surprised him:

“You did what you did against Aston Villa, City dropping points at Forest, I think even to be where you are now has surprised me a little bit. Even after the Villa game, I wasn’t thinking they were back, because they were conceding goals and you’ve got a big problem if you’re conceding goals in a title race."

He also conceded that Arsenal looked like they were back on track following a clean sheet in their 1-0 win against Leicester City:

“The clean sheet against Leicester gave me the feeling you’d go a lot closer than I thought you would. You need clean sheets back and you’d started conceding in quite a few games. The Leicester 1-0, 1-0s do very much come into a title run-in."

He added:

“That really impressed me. I confess, I thought you were done after the City game, I thought you’d really struggle to come back from that and the two games away after that you could end up dropping points.”

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Gary Neville has often backed Manchester City to win the Premier League title ahead of Arsenal

Throughout the season, Neville has backed Manchester City to win the Premier League, citing their superior quality and experience. In early February, the United legend tweeted at a Gunners fan:

"You haven’t won the league yet my friend. You have 18 games left. You any idea how hard it is to win a league with that many games left? I’ll happily change my mind when I think you will win it!"

With still a long way to go for the north London side, a victory against Everton on March 1 at home would be a significant step forward. It would put them five points clear of City after winning their game in hand.