THE BEST IS YET TO COME
Nine wins in a row. The fans are singing ‘We’ve got our Arsenal back’. Fourth in the table (above Spurs), but Emery says...
As AARON RAMSEY celebrated in front of an away end full of joy and optimism, the Arsenal supporters broke into euphoric song. ‘We’ve got our Arsenal back,’ came the cry. After this result, a ninth win on the spin, it was hard to begrudge these fans their moment.
seven weeks is a long time in English football. Back in August, Unai Emery was presented with a gruesome statistic: after two opening defeats, he had made the worst start to life as an Arsenal manager since Thomas Mitchell in 1897.
Now the historical comparisons are different. Arsenal had won nine or more in a row under only three managers — Herbert Chapman, George Graham and Arsene Wenger — and that trio have all won top-division titles.
The tickertape and the statues are a long way off for Emery but which Arsenal supporter would not be a little bit giddy after this demolition? After all, if the Gunners can do this after only a few months under Emery, how good might they become once he has been afforded more recruits and time on the training field?
‘I don’t think this was our “best”,’ Emery said. ‘We can get better. I want our fans to feel every match is a special day and show we are improving with our quality, our winning mentality, our commitment.’
Emery’s team were a delight here, responding emphatically to Fulham’s equaliser on the stroke of half-time by scoring four goals in the second half without reply.
Glorious goals, too. Both Alexandre Lacazette and Ramsey scored with efforts that belonged in the happiest days of the Wenger era and the league table makes for happy reading too, with Arsenal back in the top four and within touching distance of a title challenge.
so for Emery, the portents are good. They are good not only because his team attack with abandon but also because they have rediscovered a resilience that appeared alien to recent Arsenal teams.
In the latter Wenger years, his side might have faltered here. Away from home, having arrived in England at 5am on Friday morning from a 5,000-mile round trip to Azerbaijan, his starting XI deprived of key players such as the injured Mesut Ozil and the rested Ramsey, sokratis Papastathopoulos and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, the ingredients were in place for a tricky afternoon.
Emery’s selections raised questions but they were vindicated at every turn. The muscular sokratis seemed suited for a high- octane bout against Aleksandar Mitrovic, but instead Rob Holding played and coped admirably.
Ramsey and Aubameyang are obvious starters for most games, but Alex Iwobi was Arsenal’s most dangerous creative force, while Danny Welbeck started alongside Lacazette and his movement electrified the front line.
When the starting XI required bolstering, Emery’s substitutions were timed perfectly. Ramsey scored within three touches and 39 seconds of his arrival and Aubameyang added the gloss with two goals of his own.
Arsenal’s challenge was aided by a team still coming to terms with life at this level. Fulham play at a thousand miles per hour. At their best, this manifests as frantic pressing, speedy counter-attacks and sumptuous interplay.
Yet the tempo also leads to misplaced passes in important areas and a ragged defence.
The cold evidence of the Premier League table shows only one victory and the most goals conceded in the top flight.
For slavisa Jokanovic, the Fulham boss presented with over £100million worth of players this summer, it is a worrying situation.
‘When you put coins in the cake, you can break your teeth,’ the serb has mused, adding to the sense his task may have been complicated rather than aided by the splurge that saw 12 players join his promotion-winning squad.
Jokanovic said: ‘ We spent because we trust we can find some kind of solution, but the solution is only in my head right now.’
For all that, Fulham ought to have taken the lead. Hector Bellerin conceded possession in his own half and Luciano Vietto scuttled towards goal and his deflected strike appeared to have deceived Bernd Leno, only for the German goalkeeper to raise a claw at the final moment.
Arsenal grew in composure and authority. Iwobi was to the fore, finding gaps from the left side and releasing Welbeck, whose low cross narrowly eluded Lacazette. Iwobi broke free once more, teeing up the overlapping Nacho Monreal, who found Lacazette, and the Frenchman fired into the corner.
Instead of killing the game, Arsenal reminded us of their enduring flaws. Monreal was the offender, skewing a clearance straight to Jean Michael seri and in two passes, Fulham found a route to goal. seri located Vietto between the lines, who released Andre schurrle to dink over Leno.
At half-time any score appeared possible. Arsenal had been pegged back and we wondered whether the European exertions might tell in the second half.
Instead, their response was irresistible. They scored four more, tearing through their opponents with pace and precision. Lacazette, a devastating finisher when the mood takes him, allowed the ball to run across his body 25 yards out and he thundered his strike low and hard into the corner.
The subs arrived and Fulham’s ordeal intensified. Arsenal’s third was a picture-book goal, involving one-touch tricks from Bellerin, Lacazette, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Aubameyang as the Gunners travelled from the halfway line to goal in the blink of an eye. Ramsey applied the finishing touch with an exquisite backheel.
Fulham were by then a desolate rabble, affording their opponents too much time and space. Bellerin crossed low, where Aubameyang curled beyond Marcus Bettinelli and the forward then ran through in injury time to add the fifth.