Midway through the first half of an utterly forgettable London derby, Nuno Tavares picked up the ball near the halfway line and set off on an adventure. Suddenly, it seemed something special was happening. A brief surge of energy went round the ground. Then Tavares ran out of steam, realised that he had no idea what to do next and basically let the ball run away from his feet.
Still, on he went, Arsenal’s second-choice left-back a blur of yellow as he continued to run in a straight line, his momentum taking him all the way into West Ham’s area and giving him an excellent view of Lukasz Fabianski booting the ball away.
