Manchester City beat Burnley 1-0 at Turf Moor on Wednesday night and reached the top of the Premier League for the first time since August. [1] Burnley are relegated back to the Championship, [2] a second visit in as many seasons. The paper's Tuesday preview ran the completion arithmetic — a win put City above Arsenal on goal difference by the margin already established, and a draw did not. City chose to take the win and to leave the margin where it stood.

The night's number is twenty-eight. That is how many shots Manchester City registered at a Burnley side that had beaten Sunderland, Leeds, Wolves and Crystal Palace and then held the draw line until they could not. [2] One goal from twenty-eight shots is efficient arithmetic in the sense that one is enough. It is not efficient arithmetic in the sense that Arsenal, three-straight league defeats and losing the nine-point lead in eleven days, stays alive on goal difference. [1]

Pep Guardiola's prematch line — "do not lose the focus" — survives the match because his players did not. What it did not survive is the broader question the paper has been reading since last weekend: whether the race is now City's to lose or whether Arsenal, after losses to Crystal Palace, Aston Villa, and Bournemouth, will find the response an Arteta team at the Emirates traditionally produces against bottom-half opposition. The BBC's post-match panel ran both views. [1] Both views concede the summit is City's for the first time in eight months. The table does not lie. It just puts the decision back into the hands of the side that has done it five times in six years.

-- CHARLES ASHFORD, London