It does not feel as though it was that long ago when Arsenal trailed Tottenham by 10 points. What a turnaround there has been since then. This was a hard-fought victory over a Newcastle team who made a game of it in the second half but, when the dust had settled, the table showed Unai Emery’s team had leapfrogged Spurs and Manchester United into third place.
Aaron Ramsey fired Arsenal into a deserved lead and although Newcastle pushed they did not manage to threaten Bernd Leno’s goal. Alexandre Lacazette made the points safe with a clever lob and it added up to a 10th home win in succession in the league. Not since the 1997-98 title-winning season have Arsenal managed that.
“Are you watching Tottenham?” sang the home crowd. Arsenal must play five of their remaining seven games away from home, where they have been far less impressive but right now, the momentum in the top-four battle appears to be with them.
Arsenal brought an imposing head-to-head record into the contest. They had won their past six league fixtures against Newcastle at the Emirates, scoring 18 goals and conceding five, but the wider point was their home form against all-comers this season. Only Manchester City, Liverpool and Wolves had taken points from them. In other words, Emery’s team tend to despatch opponents on their own turf who are a way below them.
Rafael Benítez craves greater backing in the market from the Newcastle owner, Mike Ashley, in order to allow him to go toe to toe with top-four chasing rivals on occasions such as these and it has long felt as though he would be best advised to dream on.
In the real world, the Newcastle manager knows he is best served to turn this type of game into an exercise in containment; to keep men behind the ball and try to get something on the break, playing off Salomón Rondón. The lone striker had his team’s only flicker in the first-half when he beat Sokratis Papastathopoulos but Bernd Leno had the shot covered at his near post.
Controversy flared in the 13th minute. At first, it looked as though Arsenal had taken the lead, when Sead Kolasinac flicked on a Mesut Özil corner and Ramsey arrived at the far post to sweep home. Then, the whistle went and there was a moment of bemusement, because there was clearly no offside.
The replays showed Sokratis had pulled back Florian Lejeune by the sleeve and, according to the letter of the law, it might have been a foul. But Lejeune’s fall was certainly theatrical and would he really have reached Ramsey to prevent the shot? File it under soft. It was easy to wonder whether the non-award of penalties for Cardiff against Chelsea on Sunday – following wrestling inside the area – had been on the mind of the match officials.
Ramsey would not be denied. Arsenal pressed, urged on by Emery’s manic preachings from the sideline, and they made their own luck after Ramsey passed to Lacazette and darted for the return. Lacazette could not provide it but the ball broke off DeAndre Yedlin and fell to Ramsey, who threaded a low shot into the far corner.
Arsenal could have had greater reward for their dominance before the interval only for Matt Ritchie to keep out Lacazette’s shot with a header off the line. The chance had been created by Kolasinac, a marauding presence up the left, and Martin Dubravka was out of the picture in the Newcastle goal.
Could Newcastle respond in the second-half? Benítez asked Ayoze Pérez and Miguel Almirón to push a little higher, getting closer to Rondón, although it still looked as though Newcastle’s best chance could be to hustle Arsenal into an error and strike on the counter.
While the score remained 1-0, Newcastle had hope, even if it was a struggle to create much of clear-cut note. But having been penned back almost entirely in the first-half, they did start to force the issue. Ki Sung-yeung on for the former Arsenal player, Isaac Hayden, felt like an attacking change. On the other side, Mohamed Elneny for Ramsey was more defensive.
Newcastle’s plan to stymie Arsenal worked in so far as the home team did not enjoy the volume of opportunities that they might have hoped for. But they had enough of them.
The substitute, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, was denied by Dubravka but there was nothing the goalkeeper could do to keep out Lacazette, after Jamaal Lascelles had misjudged Aubameyang’s header that put the striker clear.