The Gooners in our lives possibly sensed that they were in trouble when some of us were WhatsApping them consoling messages after those three cataclysmic draws on the trot.
When they had been on the receiving end of abusive envy all season, only to see it turn in to tilty-headed solace, they knew their boys’ title-winning chances were teetering in or around the edge of the abyss.
Mikel Arteta, though, was having none of that class of talk, bigging up Arsenal’s mood ahead of their tussle with Manchester City, insisting morale was high in the camp and urging his players to savour what, he said, would be a “beautiful experience”.
But then he had to chat with BT Sport pre-match.
Rio Ferdinand: “Mikel, in the Premier League, 11 games, you haven’t beaten Man City, six of them you was in charge…”. That unhelpful stat left Mikel looking a little deflated, his mood probably not helped by the computing machine that concluded Arsenal had only a 16 per cent chance of winning at the Etihad.
Martin Keown spits in the face of computing machines, though, he was unbowed. Mikel had, he said, instilled a “winning culture” at Arsenal. “These guys ARE winners now,” he said.
“How are they winners now,” asked an increasingly belligerent Rio, “they haven’t won nuffin’!”
“Yeah... but,” Martin replied, which wasn’t an entirely convincing response.
Our host Lynsey Hipgrave tried to help Martin out by diverting his focus to analysing the task of marking the net-busting person that is Erling Haaland.
“I’m thinking if I’m playing against him, he’s getting a reducer early on, I’m going to hit him with everything early doors,” he said.
“There’s VAR today, Martin,” chuckled Joleon Lescott, although he was kind enough not to add ‘if they had it in your day, you’d have been suspended for eight ninths of the season’.
If Martin was feeling old at this point, you could only hope he didn’t see BT Sport’s first ad break. There was Ian Botham walking his golden Labrador and spotting a random woman sitting on a park bench.
“Hi Sue, are we walking today,” he asks. But her legs were “achy”, so she was bench-bound. So Ian recommended that she use a circulation boosting product that would transform her life. She tried it, and Ian and Sue haven’t stopped walking since, their circulations circulating like a washing machine on turbo.
Team news. As ever, City’s bench looked stronger than their opponents’ starting XI. Well for some. And six minutes in to the game Martin would have needed a circulation booster himself, Kevin De Bruyne doing Kevin De Bruyne things by inserting the ball in to the back of Aaron Ramsdale’s net.
That put a bit of a dampener on “a night that feels as big as it is”, as our BT commentator Darren Fletcher described it, Arsenal’s chances of winning dropping from 16 to 0.1 per cent before they’d even sucked in the atmosphere.
And it got worse, VAR concluding that Ben White’s foot had rendered John Stones onside when he headed home from De Bruyne’s free, leaving Martin wishing, come the break, that VAR had a stake thrust through its heart – and the rest of us ruing the decision that the Belgian person was too expensive for our Fantasy team.
Rio, somewhat provocatively, sniffed, in a ‘told you so’ kind of way – not so much about our Fantasy decision, more about Martin’s insistence that Arsenal are now winners.
Second half.
De Bruyne’s Fantasy points mounted up, the lad a snip at £12.1 million, him adding another goal to his night’s work. By now, the night was a beautiful experience for those who reckoned £12.1 million was a bargain.
[ Manchester City take control of title race proving four too good for ArsenalOpens in new window ]
It wound up 4-1, Haaland putting a reducer on Martin’s hopes and dreams.
All we can do is send more consoling messages to the Gooners in our lives. Arsenal may have dropped nine points from the last 12, but at least it’ll make Piers Morgan sad. If you dig deep enough, you’ll always find some consolation in life.
