NEWCASTLE ARSENAL UNAI TAKES

And he gets a tune out of Ozil!

UNAI EMERY spent 90 minutes standing in his technical area and directing his Arsenal side like an overzealous conductor.

They still don’t quite dance to his tune, hence the flapping arms, finger-pointing and wild gesticulations.

But at the final whistle, Emery simply clenched his fists and punched the air after overseeing a third successive win for the Gunners.

He has already succeeded where predecessor Arsene Wenger so miserably failed last season in notching back-toback victories on the road. And the result was never in doubt once Mesut Ozil stretched the visitors in the 58th minute after Granit Xhaka had broken the deadlock with a thunderous free-kick soon after the restart.

Newcastle, still without a win this season, seemed resigned to their fate until the dying minutes. After Petr Cech had brilliantly tipped over a close range header from Joselu in the 88th minute, Ciaran Clark met Ayoze Perez’s cross with a bullet past the keeper. But it wasn’t enough to deny Arsenal, who have climbed into the top half of the table and are now level on points with Tottenham. “We couldn’t control the game in the first half like we wanted to but the balance was much better in the second,” said Emery, who will resist wholesale changes in Thursday’s Europa League opener against Ukrainians Vorskla Poltava.

“That first goal made a big difference because it gave us confidence to keep on improving. The second finished the game.

“It was important to give better performances away from home and be more competitive but we still have to improve.” A decade ago this week,

■ All four of Xhaka’s top-flight goals are from outside the box. Kevin Keegan quit as Newcastle boss for the second time, sparking mass protests against owner Mike Ashley. Nothing much has changed. There was a pre-match demonstration and chants against Ashley towards the end of the game but manager Rafa Benitez is more focused on sparking the Toon’s season into life. “It’s a difficult time for us,” he said.

“The only positive was that again, we lost by a small margin.” Benitez has drawn criticism for his negativity this season but there was little wrong