Martin Odegaard scored once in 36 games last season, and he has four in five this one
Arsenal go to the Stadium of Light at 00:30 IST on Sunday with three wins from three and one goal conceded, and without William Saliba. Sunderland have lost two players from the same afternoon.
Sep 12, 2026
Martin Odegaard scored one goal in 36 appearances last season. He has four in five this season, including the winner in each of Arsenal’s last two games, and he takes that run to the Stadium of Light on Saturday night. Sunderland against Arsenal kicks off at 8pm in England, which is 00:30 IST on Sunday morning for anyone in India planning to stay up.
Odegaard has scored the last two winners
The first was against Chelsea on 6 September, five minutes into the second half, after Kai Havertz dummied a Christos Tzolis pass and let it run through to him. The second came in Naples on 9 September, a shot from the edge of the area that went in off the post with about 15 minutes left, and it was the only goal of Arsenal’s Champions League opener.
Mikel Arteta puts the change down to fitness and position. Odegaard missed a stack of games through injury last season, and Arteta’s line is that the captain “needs to be available” before anything else. The rest is where he is standing. Arsenal are getting the ball forward faster, which lets Odegaard play higher, and his touches in the opposition box have gone from 2.5 per 90 minutes last season to 4.3 this one.
“We have a lot of players that can take the ball there and progress the ball much better than we did in the past,” Arteta said.
One goal conceded, and no Saliba
Arsenal have three wins from three, six goals scored and one conceded, which puts them second only because Manchester City have scored one more. The single goal against them came 77 seconds into the Chelsea match and nothing has gone in since.
What makes that number odd is who has not been playing. William Saliba hurt his back with France at the World Cup and was taken off in the first half of the semi-final defeat to Spain. Arsenal decided against surgery, which spared him a four-to-five month absence, but the estimate still put him out for two to three months at minimum. A back four without its best defender has conceded once in three matches.
Arsenal also played 90 minutes in Naples on Wednesday, so some rotation is likely.
Sunderland have four points and two injured midfielders
Regis Le Bris’s side lost at Ipswich on the opening weekend, beat Fulham 1-0 at home, and drew 1-1 at Brentford last Saturday. Three goals scored, three conceded, four points, 12th. On Tuesday they knocked Hull City out of the Carabao Cup 1-0 at the Stadium of Light, Chemsdine Talbi finishing a counter-attack with a dink.
The Fulham win cost them more than it looked worth at the time. Habib Diarra came off with an injury that will keep him out for six to eight weeks, and Romaine Mundle picked up a knee problem in the same match that needed surgery. Sunderland are hoping to have Mundle back towards the end of the year. Losing two midfield options in one afternoon is the sort of thing that shows up six weeks later rather than immediately.
What the shape of it suggests
Arsenal have conceded one goal in three league games and Sunderland have scored exactly one in each of theirs. That combination points to a tight, low-scoring evening rather than a rout.
The one thing worth watching is whether Le Bris sets up to contain or to press. Containing a side that has scored six in three and taken 26 shots in a single Champions League game is the safer plan, but it also hands Odegaard exactly the space in front of the box he has been scoring from. Arsenal are the stronger team and should win. Sunderland have enough about them to make it awkward.