Manchester City - 1 Arsenal - 5 Watching this coming together of inspired forces it was tempting to imagine the doubts eating away at Manchester United minds. Dennis Bergkamp had already scored by the time the bus carrying Alex Ferguson's players edged away from Bolton, and 1-0 quickly became 3-0 while they were on the 15-mile stretch of the M61 to Manchester. Reliable information has it that Ferguson ordered the radio to be switched off before they reached Old Trafford.
If the title race has become a staring contest, eyeball to eyeball, United were the first to blink on Saturday. Arsenal, meanwhile, showed the nerve of bomb-disposal experts, mesmerising Manchester City with a fusillade of goals inspired by the brilliance of Thierry Henry and the apparent efforts of Kevin Keegan's defenders to win an entry into the next edition of Stephen Pile's Book of Heroic Failures.
"You look at yourself and ask if it is really happening," said the City defender Steve Howey. "When they play like that you just can't stop them. It's awful. There are players coming at you from every direction."
Nobody crumpled more than Richard Dunne whose chasing of Henry was akin to Wile E Coyote going after the Road Runner.
Dunne unwittingly played a part in each of the first three goals, missing only a plastic red nose as he allowed in Bergkamp, Robert Pires and Henry, before being substituted at half-time. By then Sol Campbell had headed in a fourth.
Somewhere north of Manchester Ferguson will have been stewing not only about two dropped points at Bolton and Arsenal's lead at the summit increasing to five points, but the growing chasm in goal differences. The Gunners are 13 to the good now.
At half-time the historians among Arsenal's fans might, without exaggeration, have been thinking about the record 12-0 victory against Loughborough Town in 1900, but their team settled for just one more, Patrick Vieira scoring the fifth. Nicolas Anelka's late consolation, set up by the otherwise maladroit Robbie Fowler, was a mere irritation.
The incredible thing on an afternoon when, undeniably, it was only Arsenal's drowsy contentment that spared City more humiliation in the second half, was that their fans remained so supportive.
"Any other club in the world, boos would have been ringing in our ears," Keegan said before adding: "I suppose you could say we've got the crowd, we just haven't got the players."
Perhaps it was their realisation of the effect this result would have on United's title ambitions.
"Arsenal, in my opinion, will win the Champions League," Keegan added. "They're on a different planet. The crazy thing is that they'd had two games in a week and we'd had a rest so the plan was to get them on the back foot for the first 20 minutes."
"There was great movement, as always, fluid and fluent football, and when we came forward we were always capable of scoring," he said. For the second consecutive season, fans of Arsenal might reflect they have won the title in Manchester.
MANCHESTER CITY: Nash, Dunne (Wright-Phillips 45), Howey, Sommeil, Jihai, Berkovic, Foe, Belmadi (Benarbia 65), Jensen, Fowler, Anelka. Subs Not Used: Weaver, Horlock, Goater. Goals: Anelka 87.
ARSENAL: Taylor, Lauren, Keown, Campbell, van Bronckhorst, Wiltord (Jeffers 74), Silva, Vieira, Pires (Edu 74), Bergkamp (Parlour 64), Henry. Subs Not Used: Cygan, Warmuz. Goals: Bergkamp 4, Pires 12, Henry 15, Campbell 19, Vieira 53.
Referee: P Durkin (Dorset).
