Ah yes, Mr Özil. Welcome, we’ve been expecting you. In the last two years Mesut Özil’s time in the Premier League has been not so much a bumpy road as an indeterminate drift, moments of high-grade influence mixed with long spells of meandering at the fringes.
This, though, was something else. In the course of a stunning, fast-start 3-0 victory at the Emirates Arsenal’s record signing not only scored one and made one, elegantly shredding Manchester United’s defence in the opening 20 minutes while laying on the afternoon’s decisive combination punch. The German also continued to pass, move and press at a relentlessly high level during his 75 minutes on the pitch.
Much has been made of the fact Arsène Wenger did not sign any outfield player during the summer transfer window. Well, he had one here, with the arrival finally in a key Premier League match of Özil at his most incisive, plus a glimpse perhaps of something new, too. Here Özil wasn’t just the game’s outstanding creative influence. He was spiky, dogged, assertive, an alpha-male lovely little gliding ghost of a No10.
On a mild, sunlit north London afternoon there was an air of double take about the entire opening half hour. Arsenal had spent their last five Premier League matches against United mustering up three goals in the last two years but here they got three in the first 20 minutes.
The whole thing had a kind of fantasy Wenger-world feel to it, a sort of sweatily enticing dream. Arsène, wake up. The game’s about to start. No ... No we’re 3-0 up already. Özil’s playing like a god. Arsène. Arsène, stop babbling into your pillow.
One thing is for sure. Never mind the familiar disappointments against Olympiakos in midweek, if Arsenal can reproduce the aggression and the intense will to win they showed here they have a fair shot this season at beating any team on any ground at any time. Özil is key to this.
When he flexes his shoulders and pulls himself up to the full height of his talent – not to mention operating in his favoured No10 position – Arsenal have a creative player whose ability to pass and use space is a class above anything else in the Premier League, David Silva excepted.
The challenge is just to do this more often. There is often talk among committed Özilites about his influence as an immeasurable, gossamer force, visible only to the initiated. But the fact is in two years at the club this was Özil’s first goal and second assist in 17 matches against Chelsea, Manchester City, Manchester United, Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund, the five best teams Arsenal have played in his time.
It was, though – and Özil really is a lovely, beguiling infuriating sprite of a No10 – well worth waiting for. His first significant touch was a dreamy little flick with the outside of his foot. After which Özil drifted left, dropping into Ashley Young’s space, creating pockets of alarm wherever he went.
The opening goal came via an overload in the same channel that resulted in Arsenal’s No10 sprinting to the byline and cutting the ball back for Sánchez to finish brilliantly via his right instep. Minutes late Özil scored the second, combining with Theo Walcott to set Arsenal’s centre-forward in space before taking Walcott’s pass and slotting the ball low past David de Gea for his first Premier League goal since April.
Stunned, United got to grips with the midfield gradually, producing a kind of lumbering, sideways domination that rarely promised to create pace anywhere other than in behind the pachydermic Carrick-Schweinsteiger midfield pair. Twice Özil tried his favourite 30-yard loft-pass for Walcott to run on to and was inches off both times. The third goal came from Sánchez again – and it was a genuine stunner, spanked into the top corner after a jink past Matteo Darmian.
After which there were plenty more moments of sugar from Özil. On 35 minutes he did something only semi-possible, pulling a high pass out of the air by backing into Carrick and simultaneously allowing the ball to run down his shin on tot his toe where it briefly stuck dead still, like an orange impaled on a skewer.
As the match settled into a half-speed, zombie affair Özil kept on ferreting away, pressing with rest of Arsenal’s front line and on 53 minutes drawing a booking for Wayne Rooney as he held the ball and jinked inside his (nominal) opposite number twice, United’s captain reduced to basically shoving him over in exasperation.
Two interesting points stood out in that exchange. First, Özil’s famed “bulking up” has only been apparent in snatches but here he went chest to chest with Rooney in the kind of area he was often run off the ball in his first season. And second, at that stage Arsenal seemed to be playing a de facto 4-3-3, with Aaron Ramsey a bit deeper and Walcott, Özil and Sánchez the flyers up front. It is no secret Arsenal’s problem has been playing as a “split” team, with Francis Coquelin the lone fingernail on the window ledge holding the whole thing together. With Özil in this mood, playing through the middle but also drifting to the left and right, and with Walcott and Sánchez in ceaseless motion alongside him, Wenger might even be tempted to bulk his central midfield out with an extra body. United’s attempts to “chase” the game were never more than mobility-scooter speed, a team set up to suffocate still gamely trying to work its fingers around the throat despite having already been knocked out by three swift blows to the chin.
Özil left the pitch with 15 minutes left to a huge, booming ovation around the ground, recognition of surely his outstanding performance for Arsenal to date. “We gave too much space to Özil,” Louis Van Gaal sighed afterwards, although at times like these he is quietly, elegantly irresistible.