Arsenal were once renowned as unpredictable travellers in the Premier League, but their away results this season are the foundation of Mikel Arteta’s title push.
Arsenal match-winner Gabriel Martinelli (right) with team-mate Martin Odegaard. Photo: Hannah McKay
This was a 10th victory on the road this season to keep them at the summit; those days when you never used to know which Arsenal would turn up seem a distant memory.
A soft touch, no more. As a rainbow appeared over the away end, the chants of ‘We are top of the league’ filled the air and may well remain the soundtrack for the final 14 games of the season.
It is the best away record in the division by some distance, and Gabriel Martinelli’s fine finish early in the second half rewarded another dominant and resilient display.
There is a mental toughness and unity in this squad and, a week after their dramatic late victory at Aston Villa, Arsenal always seem to find a way of winning.
Leicester were very disappointing ahead of manager Brendan Rodgers’s four-year anniversary today, with Arsenal superior in every area of the pitch.
With Oleksandr Zinchenko appointed as captain, to mark one year since the Russian invasion of his home country Ukraine, Arsenal never looked likely to hand the title advantage back to Manchester City.
There was also an eighth clean sheet of the season away from home, and goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale did not have a save to make. It has been an excellent response since the home defeat by Pep Guardiola’s City earlier this month.
Arteta said: “These wins will create more belief in the players and more belief around our club, but I had full faith that the players could do it. To do what the team has done here is very difficult; we dominated the game from start to finish. It was about going back to basics with some details that got away from us. In the last two games, especially today, we did them much better.”
While Arsenal are still continuing to dream of winning a first title since 2004, Leicester remain dangerously close to the bottom three. They are just three points clear of it now.
Source: dailylifeworld.com
