Mikel Arteta toasted the perfect start to a crunch week for his depleted Arsenal team after they won the north London derby at local rivals Tottenham Hotspur for the third time in a row.
Defender Gabriel Magalhaes headed the only goal of the game in the second half of a keenly contested Premier League match, as Arteta’s men capitalised at a set-piece yet again.
Despite missing several key men, Arsenal completed the away derby hat-trick – a boost ahead of their Champions League opener at Atalanta in midweek and next Sunday’s trip to Manchester City.
“It’s unbelievable, I don’t know when it happened in our history,” said Arteta.
“After the international break, we had a few blows. How the team reacted was magnificent. It showed a lot of maturity.
“There are things to improve but we have another victory here and it’s huge. I know how our supporters will feel about this so enjoy it.”
Gabriel escaped Cristian Romero at a corner to score the winning goal and Tottenham manager Ange Postecoglou blamed lapses of concentration for his side’s defeat.
“We lost concentration [for the goal]. We’ve got some big guys in there who really attack the ball and we just switched off for a second,” he said.
“For the most part we controlled the game today, had good territory and possession but we didn’t make the most of it and we got punished.”
Victory lifted Arsenal to second in the Premier League, two points behind leaders and defending champions City, who they visit next weekend.
Spurs, meanwhile, lie 13th with four points from four games. They head to Coventry in the EFL Cup on Wednesday and host Brentford on Saturday.
Arsenal keeper David Raya had to be alert to save twice from Dejan Kulusevski as Tottenham started brightly, but the visitors grew into the match.
Kai Havertz and Gabriel Martinelli tested Guglielmo Vicario before the Italian was beaten midway through the second half after Gabriel thumped home Bukayo Saka’s corner.
Arsenal have now scored a league-high 23 goals from set pieces, not including penalties, since the start of last season. Spurs have conceded 18, the second most in the division.