Liverpool and Arsenal are back at home this weekend with questions to answer over the seriousness of their title challenge, having both suffered shock results in their latest home games.
Liverpool were held 0-0 by second-bottom Stoke City, while more headline-grabbing was Arsenal's 2-1 defeat by Hull City, albeit against a promoted team performing much better than Stoke.
Both title aspirants bounced back with convincing home victories in the Champions League - Liverpool winning 3-1 against PSV Eindhoven and Arsenal 4-0 against Porto - and this weekend they must show the same quality against Wigan and Everton respectively.
Liverpool will be aware that they stalled badly at Anfield around this time last year. They drew 0-0 with Birmingham in their third home game - the equivalent fixture to this season's clash with Stoke (who may not be too dissimilar from ultimately relegated Birmingham) - and then drew their next two Anfield games as well. By the end of January they had won only four of their 11 home games and their title hopes had evaporated. Liverpool then embarked on a run of 10 straight home wins in the Premier League - ended by the goalless draw with Stoke - and against Wigan tonight they must prove the Stoke result was a blip, not a return to bad habits.
In truth, Liverpool under Rafa Benitez have usually put the weaker Premier League teams to the sword at Anfield. Their home-win rate against bottom-half finishers is 76 per cent (if we count Stoke and Middlesbrough, who were beaten 2-1 in Liverpool's first home game, as likely to be in that group this season).
If Wigan are a bottom-half team again, as they have been in the past two seasons, then Liverpool's win odds are spot-on.