Do we do better on Boxing Day or December 27? | Statistics | News

15 hours ago

Arsenal.com

A match on Boxing Day is usually as traditional as Christmas pudding or pulling crackers at this time of the year, but for the second straight season Gooners will be watching the action from afar as they await our festive fixture.

Another 24 hours must elapse until Ipswich Town head to Emirates Stadium, but our friends from Opta have delved into the record books and believe the delay could be a good omen for us.

Our first Boxing Day game in the Premier League was against the Tractor Boys in 1992 and resulted in a 0-0 draw, but since then we’ve been pretty successful on December 26, winning 16 of our 25 fixtures on that particular day.

Incredibly, we’ve only lost twice in the competition in that time - back in 1999 at Coventry City and in 2015 at Southampton. We are unbeaten in our last six, including Mikel Arteta’s managerial debut at Bournemouth in 2019, and subsequent wins against Chelsea, Norwich City and West Ham United in 2022 - our last Boxing Day battle.

That record puts us third in the all-time Boxing Day table, despite playing less games than the majority of the other ever-presents in the division’s history:

PL Boxing Day table P W D L Pts Man United 28 22 4 2 70 Liverpool 26 17 5 4 56 Arsenal 25 16 7 2 55 Tottenham 26 15 8 3 53 Chelsea 28 13 9 6 48 Everton 28 11 7 10 40

Due to the traditional nature of the Christmas calendar, fixtures the day after Boxing Day have been few and far between, and in fact our encounter with Ipswich this year will be just the fifth time we have taken to the field for a Premier League game on that day. However, we can take solace from the fact that we are unbeaten in those games, with three impressive victories coming in our four such matches.

On December 27, 1993, we trashed Swindon Town 4-0 with Kevin Campbell helping himself to a hat-trick, and it would be 16 years until we played on that date again but it was a similar fate for Aston Villa as they were beaten 3-0, with Cesc Fabregas bagging a brace.

A year later we were back in action two days after Christmas again, after being handed a London derby against Chelsea but once again, we prevailed thanks to a 3-1 scoreline with the Spaniard on target again alongside Alex Song and Theo Walcott. The trend continued in 2011 as Wolves came to Emirates Stadium, but our 100% record ended after Steven Flecther cancelled out an early Gervinho goal.

All that means that we have a 75% win ratio on December 27, as opposed to a not-to-be-sniffed-at 64% the day before. However, when you add those results to our Boxing Day performance, only Manchester United fans have enjoyed more festive cheer than our Gooners:

PL Boxing Day & Dec 27 table P W D L Pts Man United 32 25 5 2 80 Arsenal 29 19 8 2 65 Liverpool 28 18 6 4 60 Tottenham 31 16 10 5 58 Chelsea 32 15 9 8 54

With a small sample size of Premier League fixtures to investigate, we also asked Opta to assess our entire Football League history to find out if we have a preference for playing on December 26 or 27 - and they uncovered an interesting statistical quirk.

There is just 0.1% difference between our win percentages on either day, with Boxing Day edging ahead by the slightest margin possible:

Arsenal's all-time record after Christmas Dec 26 Dec 27 Games 87 38 Won 39 17 Drawn 20 13 Lost 28 8 Win % 44.8 44.7

However, we have been defeated just eight times in our history on December 27, with our last loss on that day coming back in 1966 at Southampton. Fixtures in that timeframe include a 2-0 north London derby win against Tottenham in 1982, and a 1-1 draw with Ipswich two years earlier - a fixture played just 24 hours after we clinched a 2-2 draw against Crystal Palace!