There is still half-a-season to go and yet already, for Arsenal, there is the feel of a title run-in.
Manchester City might be five points adrift having played a game more—Arsenal may be permitted a couple of slips—but nobody at the Emirates is unaware of the advantages City has in terms of squad and resources; everybody knows how important it is to keep the cushion and maintain momentum. And that is why it was so vital that Eddie Nketiah, having missed a chance that might have given Arsenal the victory, did guide in the winner in the final minute.
The bald facts are these: that Nketiah scored twice as Arsenal beat Manchester United, 3-2, and that Arsenal hit the halfway point of the season on 50 points. Newcastle in third and United in fourth are 11 points adrift. But the facts don’t really give the full picture. This was an extraordinary game, one of high quality and even higher drama, in which United played extremely well and yet Arsenal still deserved the win. But, until the 90th minute, it looked like being a game of frustration. Arsenal, in the final quarter of the game, was magnificent, ratcheting up the pressure degree by degree until United finally cracked.
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Until that final minute, though, the temptation had been to look on Nketiah as an unfortunate forward, one who seems doomed to draw great saves from keepers. It happened in Arsenal’s draw against Newcastle when Nick Pope denied him with a fine late block, and it looked to have happened again after 84 minutes as David de Gea got down to stop his shot after the ball had fallen to him from a corner. Could it be that there is a slight lack of precision to Nketiah’s finishing? Or is he simply unfortunate? It was possible then to imagine a future in which Arsenal do not go on to win the league and he and a lot of fans fret about the two wasted chances and four points that got away.
If that is their future, though, it will not be this game they think of. Oleksandr Zinchenko crossed, Martin Ødegaard squeezed out a half-shot as Fred slid in and Nketiah reacted smartly to guide the looping ball past de Gea. The doubts disappeared and the Emirates reverberated to the sound of the Arsenal crowd chanting, “Eddie! Eddie!” He is an unlikely hero, playing only because of the injury to Gabriel Jesus, but he has seized his chance superbly; a lot of title wins are inspired by improbable heroes.
United had been the only side to have beaten Arsenal this season and has been in great form recently. Even with Casemiro suspended, this looked a huge test. And Arsenal passed it, all the more impressively because it had to work so hard to do so. For all the excellence of its play this season, perhaps the biggest difference in this Arsenal to previous campaigns is its mentality.
Yet this began as another chapter in the renaissance of Marcus Rashford. After a couple of years of stagnation, not helped—psychologically or tactically—by the presence of Cristiano Ronaldo, he looks sharp again, able to operate on his preferred left side, cutting infield onto his right foot. That was how he got the opener here, hitting a low 25-yard shot past Aaron Ramsdale. It’s one of Rashford’s great gifts that he is able to generate significant power with limited back lift, the result being that a partially unsighted Ramsdale had barely flinched before the ball was flashing past him.
Previous iterations of Arsenal might have faltered at that, particularly in the knowledge that Manchester City had closed to within two points by beating Wolves earlier in the afternoon. But this Arsenal has a self-belief and a momentum. And this United is not yet as secure as it would hope to be. Aaron Wan-Bissaka was caught by the Arsenal press leading to a corner, which was carefully worked before Granit Xhaka crossed for Nketiah to head an equalizer.
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From then Arsenal looked the better side, but after Bukayo Saka, brilliant throughout, had put Arsenal ahead with a whipped low shot having cut in from the right, Lisandro Martínez levelled with a cleverly lofted header after Ramsdale had collided with Takehiro Tomiyasu in trying to claim a corner. Again, though, Arsenal kept coming, and Saka had an effort deflected against the post long before the late drama.
There is still a long way to go, and City will be a remorseless rival, but Arsenal is now beginning truly to believe and, on the basis of this performance, with good reason.
