Emerson Royal was sent off at the Emirates
(Picture: AFP via Getty Images)It has been a regular criticism of Arsenal over the years that they cannot simply lose important matches - they must always implode. Last season’s north London derby at Tottenham was a case in point, the manner of defeat handing Spurs the initiative in the race for the top four despite the fact that the Gunners’ fate was still in their own hands.
For once, here at the Emirates, the shoe was on the other foot as the hapless Emerson Royal was sent off after 62 minutes of what turned into a carnival of a derby day for the Gunners as they extended their lead at the top of the Premier League with a 3-1 win.
By the time these sides meet again in January it will have been getting on for nine years since either side won away from home in the Premier League in this fixture and 13 since Tottenham last triumphed at the Emirates.
For a fixture that has become, objectively, so predictable in outcome, it is remarkable that the north London derby retains a rightful reputation for consistently delivering the goods - and that the consequences for such likely defeats so often turn out to be severe. Only last season, for instance, defeat here signalled the beginning of a very swift end for Nuno Espirito Santo.
There was little need for things to turn calamitous here. A narrow loss (Spurs were 2-1 down at the time of Emerson’s dismissal) would have stung on the way home tonight, and probably in the morning, too, but in the grand scheme of things, beyond the partisan divide of north London, would have offered little cause for definitive assessment as to what each side’s season may hold from here.
A four-point gap between the rivals would probably have offered a fairer representation of their respective starts to the campaign even before today, and is certainly not the kind of margin that Spurs will fear overhauling later in the campaign, having been there and done it only a few months ago.
But Royal’s red card, albeit perhaps a touch harsh, signalled the end of what had been a finely-poised contest, Arsenal the better side but hardly home and hosed, and before Conte could react, Granit Xhaka had fired past Hugo Lloris to start the home party.
When the Italian did make his move, it was a concession, a quadruple change that screamed damage limitation, paying heed to the possible lasting impact of a more comprehensive scoreline. When the final whistle blew, the away end had, unsurprisingly, been largely empty for some time and the feeling was of dominance asserted, of a rival being run out of town.
Until Royal’s red, the game had largely gone to script, Spurs compact but waiting to spring loose, Arsenal controlling, probing, but leaving gaps on the break.
The level of tactical buy-in Conte is exacting from his players is clear. Richarlison, who has spent the last fortnight wearing one of the most inherently flair-infused shirts on the planet, that of Brazil’s No9, was willingly repositioned on one side of a midfield four that was both flat and deep out of possession, with Heung-min Son, scorer of a 14-minute hat-trick in his last League outing, tucked in on the other.
For the large part, the plan worked, the lesser-cited bank of four and one of five denying Arsenal the spaces in which the likes of Oleksandr Zinchenko and Martin Odegaard have thrived this term. Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli and Gabriel Jesus each made darting surges between bodies only to find more in their path inside an overpopulated penalty area.
Perhaps though, it was wishful thinking to hope to contain an Arsenal side playing with this kind of verve and on occasion - including the most costly ones - Spurs were guilty of taking their manager’s instruction to the Nth degree.
Their passivity allowed Arsenal 22 passes and eventually the space for Thomas Partey to curl gloriously into the top corner unopposed from no more than 25 yards, then Saka the room to get a shot off, which Hugo Lloris parried onto Cristian Romero, allowing Jesus to bundle in.
In between, Harry Kane scored his customary north London derby penalty (half of his 14 goals in this fixture have come from the spot) and became the first man to score 100 goals away from home in the Premier League, reaching the landmark at the least surprising of venues.
Defeat for Spurs was, statistically, similarly predictable, just as the odds will almost certainly favour a home win when Arsenal travel up the Seven Sisters Road in the New Year. But it did not have to be quite this bad.
