Nicolas Pepe, Alexandre Lacazette, Mesut Ozil and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang all scored yesterday.
Arsenal’s improved second half performance was enough to blow Newcastle away at the Emirates Stadium yesterday and chalk up a 4-0 win.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Nicolas Pepe, Mesut Ozil and Alexandre Lacazette got on the scoresheet, with the Frenchman’s goal sparking wilder celebrations than would ordinarily be expected for the fourth goal of a 4-0 win because it ended his long scoring drought.
That quartet had Arsenal fans salivating in the summer, when Pepe’s big-money arrival augmented the host of attacking talent on offer to then Gunners boss Unai Emery.
Emery’s reluctance to play Ozil and general inability to settle on an attacking style meant that the four were seldom seen together, meaning that Arsenal fans have been left to wonder what unleashing the quartet together might be like.
Arteta has completed Ozil’s reintegration into the setup and the prospect of including all four of yesterday’s goalscorers in the same starting eleven must be back on his mind now.
That’s what he did during his only other league win as Gunners boss, the 2-0 victory over Manchester United on New Year’s Day.
Now Lacazette has ended his goal drought and Pepe and Ozil look to have boosted their confidence, can Arsenal’s fantastic four finally start living up to that pre-season excitement?
When Pepe was signed, it was not too difficult to summise that spending of that scale might have been more useful at the back, but it meant Arsenal should have been able to outscore teams and use attack as the best form of defence.
Given the improvement under Arteta, the time for that may well be now. It won’t work in every game, and the right balance is needed, but the quartet are ready for a regular run of matches in tandem.
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