Saudi takeover turn tables in Newcastle-Arsenal rivalry

Newcastle want to change history. They set to work in October 2021, when the financially powerful ownership that now runs the club came in. That management has already paid dividends across the board, including a return to the Champions League 20 years later last season. In the particular case of the clashes with Arsenal, the tables have also been turned.
On Wednesday, in the second leg of the EFL Cup semi-finals, the Magpies welcome to St. James' Park a Gunners side they already defeated 2-0 in the first leg. That victory was the 3rd in the last 4 matches against the same opponent. The 4th in the last 7 matches. These figures contrast sharply with those of several teams in recent decades in terms of head-to-head encounters.
To find another four Newcastle wins over the Londoners, you have to go back to 2002. At the end of the previous year, the Magpies won 3-1 at Highbury, with Shearer's goal in the 86th minute making it 1-2 and Robert's goal in the 90th minute. That victory also gave Sir Bobby Robson's side the Premier League lead at the time.
Between then and November 2021, the two sides have met 42 times, with Arsenal dominating on aggregate. The Magpies could only manage four wins and eight draws to the capital side's 30 victories. Within this dynamic, there was a tremendously bad run of form for the St. James' Park side: between 2012 and 2021, they lost 18 out of 19 matches against the Gunners.

On 27th November 2021, Newcastle lost 2-0 at the Emirates in the first match against this opponent since the arrival of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund. Be that as it may, at that moment a very different scenario began that smiles, and by far, to the Magpies.
In the last 7 matches, the Magpies have won 4 times. The first was in May 2022, when they beat Arsenal 2-0 in the second to last round of the Premier League. This stumble, incidentally, knocked the Londoners out of the Champions League places for which they did not qualify. The next match ended in a goalless draw before Arsenal, on matchday 35 of the 2022-23 season, won 2-0 at St. James' Park.
Newcastle, from then on, picked up the pace to make it three wins in the last four meetings. They won narrowly in the first leg of the 2023-24 and, although they lost 4-0 in the second leg of that Premiership, they won 1-0 last November and won 2-0 in the first leg of the EFL Cup semi-final to be decided on Wednesday.