This wonderful match was hailed as "playground football'' by Sir Alex Ferguson, whose Manchester United team were edged by Arsene Wenger's youngsters patently relishing the opportunity to express themselves without being bullied. Leaving the playground afterwards, Arsenal's players were also keen to voice their admiration for the French professor shaping their fortunes.
After all the criticism of Wenger, some legitimate, much ludicrous, the players were determined to show their support in deed, through relentless endeavour, and then through word. "We did it for him because he has believed a lot in us,'' reflected Cesc Fabregas. "Without him, probably apart from William Gallas and Mikael Silvestre, the rest of us may never have had the chance to play football. We owe him a lot.''
The match-winner, Samir Nasri, agreed. "He's one of the best in the world and it's a great honour for me to play for him,'' said Nasri, whose two goals paved the way for a cathartic triumph. "He's always very affectionate with his players.''
Nasri's performance exuded all the qualities Wenger seeks in his players, all the elevated technique and movement, and the newcomer from Marseille led the way in reminding the doubters of the character within the Arsenal dressing room. When Nasri glided away from the Footballer of the Year, Cristiano Ronaldo, with the ball, it embodied Arsenal's belief – and Wenger's commitment to recruit promise and turn into rich potency.
"Nasri is the shortest adapter to the game [in England] because I haven't seen many players so quickly adapting to the intensity of the game,'' said Wenger, although Bacary Sagna settled equally fast last season. "Nasri has outstanding physical qualities. He doesn't look it but he is outstanding physically and he has great technique and above all, he is very intelligent.''
The man himself had dreamed of playing for Arsenal. "I used to watch them on TV, when Robert Pires was there, Thierry Henry and Patrick Vieira,'' said Nasri. "Arsenal seem like a French team. The manager is French, we've got African players who speak French, so, obviously, there's a lot of French talking everywhere. And, in France, we consider Arsenal like the 21st team of our league.
"Maybe we don't have the experience of Liverpool, United or Chelsea, but we showed how mature we've become. We are back in it [the title race], but we always thought we were in it anyway, even before that game. We can definitely achieve the title this season.''
Such defiance and dynamism was seen everywhere. William Gallas headed away most danger. Gael Clichy, outstanding against Ronaldo, was so determined to win the ball off Wayne Rooney at one point that he accepted the inevitable follow-through from the United striker, the studs going into his stomach.
Wenger understandably took so much pride in his players' performance and believes they have re-joined what could be the most thrilling and open title race in years. "It could be tighter than everybody expected it to be, because the teams in the second part of the league have improved and it's difficult to go away and win at Stoke, Blackburn, Bolton, Wigan,'' said Wenger.
All the pre-match hysteria of this match was put into perspective during a moving period of silence for Remembrance Day when the whole stadium stood in salute, the only noise being murmurs of disapproval towards the BBC radio commentator Alan Green, who had remained seated. Such silences are invariably followed by a cathartic roar and there could be no doubt that Arsenal's fans were fully behind the players and Wenger.
The diminution of his attacking resources through injury (Emmanuel Adebayor) and suspension (Robin van Persie) had forced Wenger into a system that proved perfectly designed to deal with United's midfield strength; introducing Abou Diaby into midfield meant Arsenal went three v two in the centre. As hard as Anderson (particularly) and Michael Carrick worked, they were outnumbered by Fabregas, Diaby and Denilson.
"I will use it again because we felt going forward we scored many goals but defensively we conceded too many from outside the box basically,'' observed Wenger, acknowledging past failings. Park Ji-sung drifted inside from the left to help United's overwhelmed midfield at times but this actually helped lead to Arsenal's opener.
Patrice Evra was exposed, panicked into fouling Sagna. Fabregas' free-kick was headed out by Dimitar Berbatov, poorly, the ball dropping just outside the box. Nasri took advantage, firing a shot via Gary Neville past Edwin van der Sar.
If United should have kept out Nasri's first, his second was unstoppable. Here was one of the moves of the season, a 16-pass affair involving all but Silvestre of Arsenal's outfield players, climaxing in Nasri letting fly from 20 yards.
United, though, had chances to score, Rooney and Ronaldo missing glorious chances. As the match nudged towards the frantic six minutes of injury time, Rafael da Silva confirmed his burgeoning talent with a magnificent strike after replacing Gary Neville.
Ferguson has an important call to make on Neville soon as Rafael's ability, and Wes Brown's reliability, cannot be ignored. Rio Ferdinand also deserves the captaincy on a full-time basis as he, unlike Neville and Ryan Giggs, is guaranteed to start. United, though, will fight back from this. Just as Arsenal did from their brief dip.
Ferguson reflected afterwards on the pressures of an away game in the Premier League after a European game. "They say the league is not handicapped – I am not so sure,'' said the United manager. "Having every game away from home following a European tie is not easy. Going from Celtic on Wednesday to play at Arsenal the following Saturday lunchtime is hard, although funnily enough, I did not think it was a problem today.''
