Saturday went about as well as any Arsenal supporter could have realistically hoped for.
Compared to events in Newcastle seven days before, their team’s meeting with Burnley was almost completely stress-free, bar a couple of minutes after Josh Brownhill’s equaliser.
Arsenal took the lead just before half-time, restored it almost instantly after Burnley’s leveller and had a two-goal cushion and just over 10 minutes to see out after Fabio Vieira had been sent off. Mercifully, VAR was barely needed at all.
Their afternoon got off to the perfect start before the game at the Emirates had even kicked off. Fans watching the TV screens in the various pubs dotted around Highbury and Islington or else on their TNT Sports apps on their phones cheered when Wolves scored an injury-time equaliser against Tottenham and celebrated wildly when Mario Lemina added a second with virtually the last kick of the game. The first anti-Spurs song was sung 90 seconds after kick-off.
Arsenal’s 3-1 victory over Burnley meant that they moved above their north London rivals in the Premier League table for the first time since the start of September and given the wretched injury misfortune Ange Postecoglou’s side has suffered, it’s a position that they could become accustomed to in the weeks ahead.
In a way, this weekend showcased the differences between Arsenal and Spurs, a club that has undergone a rebuild and another at the start of theirs. Arsenal’s win was defined by the depth and quality of their squad players; Tottenham’s defeat was defined by the lack of depth and drop off in quality of theirs.
In fairness to Tottenham, Arsenal’s absentee list was shorter and nowhere near as damaging. Just as Postecoglou has been severely compromised from having the spine of his team ripped out, so would Mikel Arteta if he lost William Saliba and Martin Odegaard for a couple of months and had Gabriel Magalhaes suspended at the same time.
Still, the Gunners have had fitness issues of their own to contend with. Neither Odegaard nor Gabriel Jesus have started a game since the win in Seville on 24 October, each missing three Premier League games in a row. Eddie Nketiah wasn’t able to start against Burnley either, while Ben White’s ever-present league record was wiped out on Saturday due to a knock sustained in midweek. Bukayo Saka was patched together after hobbling off against Sevilla.
With Jurrien Timber and Thomas Partey both sidelined long-term and the luckless Emile Smith Rowe struck down again, Arsenal currently have eight players unavailable due to injury or suspension. Tottenham, meanwhile have nine players out while Newcastle lead the chart that no club ever wants to with 12, according to the website Premier League injuries.
But Arsenal are far better equipped to absorb such hefty blows than Spurs are after overhauling and upgrading their squad since Arteta took charge in December 2019. Arteta has had eight transfer windows to make his imprint, Postecoglou just one. Besides academy graduates, only Mohamed Elneny, Gabriel Martinelli and Saliba’s arrivals in north London predate Arteta’s.
It means that Arteta has the luxury of replacing his big players with like-for-like replacements when required, something that Postecoglou simply cannot.
Besides the opening 10 minutes in which they took the lead through Brennan Johnson, Spurs looked like an Antonio Conte side more than a Postecoglou one at Molineux. It was a scrappy, disjointed performance, understandable by the loss of Micky van de Ven, Cristian Romero and in particular, James Maddison. In contrast, Arsenal were able to play as they have done all season with fringe players stepping up to fill the void.
Leandro Trossard, making just his third Premier League start of the campaign and first in over a month, was central to their victory, scoring the first with a brave header and setting up the second with a pinpoint corner. The Belgian is Arteta’s 12th or 13th man but would be a key player for virtually any other club in the division.
Since joining Arsenal from Brighton in January, he has scored four goals and set up 11 more in 28 league games, with over half of those appearances coming as a substitute. He has averaged a direct goal contribution (a goal or assist) once every 82 minutes. Having a player of his ilk ready to plug in and play is invaluable.
Oleksandr Zinchenko has also been in and out of the team recently, with the more defensively savvy Takehiro Tomiyasu earning a run in the side at left-back. He also capped his start with a goal, scoring a superbly taken scissor kick from a corner, while his influence on the game was such that he ranked first on the pitch for touches, duels won and tackles, among other metrics.
It is further proof of Arsenal’s enviable depth that they have 13 different goalscorers in the league this season, more than any other club.
Arsenal have largely nailed their recruitment in the Arteta years, learning from glaring errors of the past by targeting younger, hungrier players, instead of those on the decline. Tottenham have done similar but in less time. They are one point but a few windows behind.
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