I thought Theo had done well, he looked better than he did during his stints as centre forward last season. Finishing aside, I think he played better yesterday than he did when he scored a hat trick against Newcastle in the 7-3 victory last season. More than Theo’s individual performance I thought it made the whole team look more dangerous when attacking. The ball never stuck in the way it would do with Giroud and our link up play from striker to midfield wasn’t anywhere near as good but when midfielders had the ball in the Tottenham half they didn’t just have a 10 yard passing radius, all of a sudden Theo Walcott stretches out the pitch and gives his team mates a bigger area to pass into. I’d even go as far as to say Walcott’s centre forward impersonation is better than any of

When Arsenal beat Tottenham early in the season the excuse back in August was that Tottenham’s players needed time to bed in after forking out huge money on new players, we are into the second half of the season and Tottenham’s mix and match side were comprehensively outplayed by Arsenal’s mix and match side.

I had wondered how seriously Arsenal would take the game given the amount of pressure football that the Arsenal squad have had to endure, even more so given recent injuries but I needn’t have worried myself because we put in our best performance for a while.

In recent weeks we have had to grind out performances without playing very well. There could be a number of factors that have contributed to this such as fatigue or the very strong winds in certain games, I wondered if we could continue to pick up victories until our game came back together. Yesterday we passed the ball quicker and sharper and looked more like our September self rather than the December Arsenal.

But the game could have taken a different turn as early as the eighth minute. Christian Eriksen raced in between the Arsenal defence into the penalty box but his left footed shot was blocked by Lukasz Fabianski from close range. Had the deputising Pole have taken longer to get off his line, Arsenal could have been a goal down with pretty much the first chance of the game and we would have had to chase the match.

I think Lukasz Fabianski still gets a little unfairly judged by some, his past mistakes have stuck in the minds of some and they expect him to be that player. Fabianski has come a long way from the punching the ball into his own net days. Whenever he has been given a chance, he has taken that chance even if it is for a one off game after a long stretch without football such as yesterday or against Bayern Munich in Germany. He is hugely unfortunate because injuries have basically stopped his Arsenal career. I am more than happy with Szczesny as our first choice but I get the feeling that had Fabianski remained injury free from that Bayern game I’d be pleased with the way it all worked out.

I mentioned in my preview that the midfield area could be interesting due to Sherwood playing two midfielders against our rotating creative middle and we just had too much for them to cope. Arteta, Cazorla, Rosicky, Gnabry and Wilshere played some wonderful one touch football around their penalty box. Theo Walcott was played in with a similar chance to Eriksen’s after Cazorla nudged a ball into his path but Lloris blocked with his legs. Monreal would have had a tap in at the far post had Theo have seen him making a late run to support our number 14 who was given a rare chance to play as centre forward.

I thought Theo had done well, he looked better than he did during his stints as centre forward last season. Finishing aside, I think he played better yesterday than he did when he scored a hat trick against Newcastle in the 7-3 victory last season. More than Theo’s individual performance I thought it made the whole team look more dangerous when attacking. The ball never stuck in the way it would do with Giroud and our link up play from striker to midfield wasn’t anywhere near as good but when midfielders had the ball in the Tottenham half they didn’t just have a 10 yard passing radius, all of a sudden Theo Walcott stretches out the pitch and gives his team mates a bigger area to pass into. I’d even go as far as to say Walcott’s centre forward impersonation is better than any of Podolski’s strikers performances in an Arsenal shirt to date.

I’d be interested to see it again.

How good was Serge Gnabry? How good is Serge Gnabry going to be?

Fantastic.

Even more so when you consider that he is raw and so inexperienced at this level. 18 years of age playing in a North London derby and not looking at all phased about what is happening around him. Oh and this is also without a run of games under his belt. He is coming in from the cold where he has only had training sessions for weeks on end.

I had to wait until the 48th minute before I noticed a Gnabry mistake, whether that be caught in possession or a bad pass. Before that he made the telling contribution in creating the first goal for Santi Cazorla. With his unique running style, he cut inside and bustled his way through Tottenham challenges making opponents lose their shape by having to close the man down thus leaving ample room for Santi Cazorla to ghost in on the left to crash home the opening goal on his ‘weaker’ left foot.

Serge is not missing a great deal from his game already, he can do pretty much everything. One touch, use both feet, cross, shoot the works. But he has a burst that opens teams up and we have already seen that burst create a chance already this season. Think back to Swansea away, just before half time, Young Gnabry decided to take matters into his own hands and drive inside just as he did yesterday, his nudge through was to Giroud on that day and the Frenchman scuffed his shot wide. I like players who can up the gears and give you something other than passing and Serge Gnabry has that.

Tottenham offered very little apart from the occasional counter attack which we defended very well against from the 8th minute onwards. When we lost the ball we got back behind the ball in a very narrow and compact shape. It reminded me a little of when Manchester United played against us under Alex Ferguson. Individually I thought Laurent Koscielny was outstanding and added Adebayor to his collection of strikers kept quiet. Don’t be upset Emmanuel, Laurent has dealt with strikers far better than you.

I am of the opinion that it is unfair to state definitively that the Koscielny and Vermaelen partnership cannot work. When those two played together regularly it was when we defended completely differently as a team. We all acknowledge that the team changed defensively after our 2-1 defeat at White Hart Lane last season. It began in Munich and has continued until now. The changes have not been simply a personnel change. Since then Vermaelen has only played a couple of times alongside Koscielny so perhaps we should judge their performances together from now on rather than when they were often left isolated at the back.

Tomas Rosicky is the perfect example for what is right about our team defending, closing down the opposition and not allowing his opponents time to make a pass. Midway through the second half he sprinted after Danny Rose who had just received a pass from the (once again) ineffective Roberto Soldado (a perfect example of why Arsene didn’t go and buy just any striker in the summer) and instead of playing an early pass wide to his team mate he took and extra touch which allowed our 33 year old evergreen Czech to nip in and poke the ball away. Rosicky was a long way from goal and I’d imagine he was one of the few players in the Arsenal team who could have made it into the Tottenham penalty area before being tackled. Rosicky’s finishing has never been his strength but his Theo Walcott style dinked finish over the advancing Lloris was a thing of beauty.

Tottenham must have known the game was done from that point. The last goal we conceded at home was against Everton late in the game and there was no way that Tottenham were going to score twice.

Theo should have had his name on the score sheet after missing some good chances which we know he can take so there is no worries there, it was more important that he played the role of centre forward well and he did just that. He clashed his knee against Danny Rose late in the game and had to come off on a stretcher. His 2-0 gesture was hardly anything worth frothing over this morning but you just know that will be the focus today. Why focus on a convincing Arsenal victory when you can have some controversy. Football fans can dish out abuse all game but a gentle smirky reminder of the score can lead to so many throwing coins? It is not as if they were not already aware of the gulf of quality on the pitch. *ducks the internet coins thrown my way*

Given the media attention I wouldn’t be surprised if Theo was handed out a ban of some sort. This is how these things work now isn’t it? See the Eduardo vs Celtic incident as proof.

Anyway I’d rather focus on the performance and result, a result that puts us in the next round of the cup and should give us some more belief before the Aston Villa game. For me, what was most pleasing about this game was the return of Wengerball. I hope it sticks around for the next few months, we will need it.

Well played Arsenal.