A Fairytale' — Semenyo the $87m Man Resurrects Haaland and Fires City to Arsenal's Heels as 15-Minute Blitz Changes Title Race

MANCHESTER, England – The rain came down in sheets over the Etihad Stadium. By the time it subsided, Arsenal's nine-point lead had been washed away.
Manchester City's 3-0 demolition of Fulham on Wednesday night was not merely a victory. It was a statement of intent delivered with surgical precision—three goals in fifteen devastating first-half minutes that transformed the complexion of a title race many had already conceded to Mikel Arteta's Arsenal.

But beneath the routine scoreline lies a deeper narrative. This was the night Erling Haaland finally broke his open-play duck. This was the night Nico O'Reilly announced himself as Guardiola's latest academy prodigy. And above all, this was the night Antoine Semenyo—City's $87 million January gamble—justified every penny of his record-breaking price tag.

"It's all a fairytale right now," Semenyo beamed afterwards, still dripping from the Manchester downpour. "It's just being part of a great team, a great environment, the coach has been great and they've made it easy for me to settle" .

Five goals in eight games since his seismic move from Bournemouth. A goal and an assist inside six minutes against a bewildered Fulham. The kind of start that transforms expensive signings into club legends before their first season concludes.
Arsenal's lead is now three points. The Gunners hold a game in hand. But the psychology of this pursuit has shifted irrevocably.
THE FIRST-HOUR BLITZ: How City Broke Fulham in Fifteen Minutes

The margin of victory flatters Fulham's resistance.
Phil Foden had already tested Bernd Leno twice before the 24th minute. The opener, when it arrived, carried an air of inevitability. Matheus Nunes' delivery deflected off Sander Berge, the ball dropping obligingly into Semenyo's path. Five yards out. No goalkeeper on earth was saving it .
Antoine Semenyo (24') — 1-0.

Fulham blinked. Harry Wilson immediately launched a counter-attack that briefly threatened Donnarumma's goal. Fifty-one seconds later, City were two goals clear.
Semenyo, now tormentor-in-chief, slid a perfectly weighted pass behind Fulham's exposed defensive line. Nico O'Reilly—nineteen years old, making only his fourth Premier League start—advanced with the composure of a decade-long veteran. His chip over the advancing Leno was exquisite .

Nico O'Reilly (30') — 2-0.
The game, for all competitive purposes, was over. But Haaland had not yet had his say.
'His First Open-Play Goal Since December'
The statistic had become an albatross. Fifty-three days. Eight Premier League games. A solitary penalty against Liverpool—clinically dispatched, yes, but not the open-play contribution expected of the game's most prolific finisher.
Then, in the 39th minute, Foden slid a pass into Haaland's feet on the edge of the box. The Norwegian shifted the ball onto his right foot. The shot was low, precise, unstoppable—arrowing through bodies and into the bottom-right corner .
Erling Haaland (39') — 3-0.
Pep Guardiola immediately signalled to the bench. Haaland would not return for the second half. The message was deliberate: you have done your job, now rest for what comes next.

"His first Premier League goal from open play for nearly two months," the broadcasters noted . The drought was over. Whether the floodgates have reopened may determine the destination of the title.

When City dispatched £70 million ($87 million) to Bournemouth in January, the football world raised collective eyebrows. Semenyo was excellent on the south coast—powerful, direct, increasingly productive—but was he this transformative?
The answer, eight games into his City career, is unequivocal.
Five goals. Two assists. A goal contribution every 94 minutes. The kind of instant impact that separates shrewd recruitment from expensive desperation.
"It's just being part of a great team, a great environment," Semenyo repeated, almost embarrassed by the attention . His modesty belies his importance. City pursued him specifically to address a chronic issue—excessive reliance on Haaland's finishing and Foden's creativity. Semenyo offers both.
Against Fulham, he demonstrated the complete package: poacher's instinct for the opener, creator's vision for O'Reilly's goal. At 26, entering his physical prime, Semenyo may prove the difference between City chasing Arsenal and City catching them.

THE TABLE: Three Points, One Game, Everything to Play For
The mathematics are now brutally simple.
City: 53 points from 26 games.
Arsenal: 56 points from 25 games .

The Gunners travel to Brentford on Thursday evening. Victory restores a six-point cushion. Defeat—or even a draw—compresses the gap further, with the Etihad showdown between the top two still to come.
"Successive wins for City have changed the complexion of the standings," observed James Robson of the Associated Press .
Arsenal had opened a nine-point lead on Saturday. Forty-eight hours later, City responded with victory at Anfield—Haaland's late penalty breaking Liverpool resistance. Seventy-two hours after that, Fulham were dispatched with contemptuous ease.
The psychology of a title race is not determined by mathematics alone. Arsenal now travel to west London knowing that City have done their work. The pressure shifts. The margin for error evaporates.
THE SECOND HALF: Professionalism Over Spectacle
Haaland watched the second half from the bench, wrapped in a club-issue coat, expression impassive. Guardiola had seen enough.
Omar Marmoush replaced the Norwegian and immediately tested Leno. Rodri dictated tempo from deep. Ruben Dias marshalled a defence that has now kept consecutive clean sheets for the first time since November.
Fulham, to their credit, did not capitulate entirely. Emile Smith Rowe drifted dangerously. Rodrigo Muniz forced Donnarumma into a sharp save. Josh King, introduced late, tested the Italian's reflexes once more .
But the clean sheet never truly threatened. City had entered conservation mode—three points secured, energy preserved for the challenges ahead. This is what champions do. This is what title-winning teams look like in February.

THE GUARDIOLA EQUATION: 'We Still Can Catch Arsenal'
Pep Guardiola has spent two decades managing at football's summit. He understands momentum. He understands psychology. And he understands that Wednesday's victory, however routine, carries significance beyond the three points it deposited.
"We still can catch Arsenal," he insisted earlier this week . The statement was not bravado. It was mathematics tempered by experience.
Guardiola withdrew Haaland at half-time not merely to rest his striker, but to send a message to Arsenal: we are so confident, so utterly in control, that our most potent weapon can sit idle for forty-five minutes and the result never wavers.
Whether that message resonates in Arteta's dressing room remains to be seen. But the days of Arsenal cruising to an unassailable lead are over.
WHAT COMES NEXT
The fixtures offer no respite. City travel to Tottenham on February 19, host Newcastle four days later, then face the small matter of a Champions League round-of-16 tie against Inter Milan. April brings Arsenal to the Etihad in what increasingly resembles a title decider.
Fulham, meanwhile, slip to 12th—three consecutive defeats, ten points above relegation but drifting into mid-table irrelevance . Marco Silva's side began the season with European aspirations. Those dreams have curdled into consolidation.
And Antoine Semenyo returns to training, a player transformed. Eight games ago, he was a Bournemouth winger with potential. Now he is a City match-winner, an $87 million man justifying his fee, a protagonist in a title race he joined halfway through.

"It's all a fairytale," he said.
For Semenyo, for Haaland, for a City side that refused to surrender their crown without a fight—the fairytale is only beginning.
For Arsenal, watching from afar, the story is becoming increasingly unfamiliar.
They are no longer the hunters.

They are the hunted.