Arsenal and Coventry City have only faced in the opening league game of a season once – in 1993-94, the Sky Blues won 3-0 at Highbury thanks to a hat-trick from Mick Quinn.

This is the first Premier League meeting between Arsenal and Coventry since February 2001, a 1-0 win for the Gunners at Highfield Road. Since Coventry did the double over Arsenal in 1993-94, they’ve won just one of 14 top-flight meetings (D5 L8), a 3-2 win on Boxing Day in 1999.

Arsenal have won their opening match in each of the last four Premier League seasons, since losing 2-0 to Brentford in 2021-22. The Gunners have only won their first match in five in a row once before in their league history, doing so between 2001-02 and 2005-06.

This is Coventry City’s first Premier League campaign since 2000-01, when they started their season with a 3-1 defeat to Middlesbrough. They’ve not started a league season with a win since beating Nottingham Forest 2-1 in the Championship in 2021-22 (D2 L2 in four seasons since).

This will be Coventry’s first league match at Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium, though they’ve lost there in the League Cup (1-6 in 2012) and FA Cup (0-4 in 2014). Only two teams (including Arsenal) have won their first ever league match at the ground – West Ham in April 2007 and Hull City in September 2008.

Since the start of 2023-24, Arsenal have won 17 of their 18 Premier League games against promoted sides, with the exception a 2-2 draw at Sunderland last season. At home, the Gunners are unbeaten in 45 Premier League home games against promoted sides, the longest such run by any team in the competition’s history (W40 D5).

This is Coventry City’s first Premier League match in 25 years and 94 days, the longest gap between games by a side in the competition’s history. They’ve lost their last seven away league games against the reigning top-flight champions, most recently going down 4-2 at Manchester United in April 2001.

Arsenal – who won their final five league games en route to winning the title last season – have won each of their three MD1 Premier League games as reigning champions (most recently v Everton in 2004-05), with two of those coming against promoted sides (Nottingham Forest in 1998-99, Birmingham in 2002-03).

Mikel Arteta lost his first ever managerial meeting with Coventry’s Frank Lampard, in what was his first home game as Arsenal boss back in December 2019 (1-2 vs Chelsea). Since then, the Spaniard is unbeaten in all five against Lampard in all competitions, winning the last four in a row (D1).

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has won 149 of his 248 Premier League games in charge. Victory here would see him become just the fifth manager to reach 150 victories in fewer than 250 games in the competition, after Pep Guardiola (204), José Mourinho (231), Jürgen Klopp (237), and Alex Ferguson (247).