Wesley Fofana knows all about what it’s like to try something unexpected, especially if it involves ducking down the hard shoulder of the A3 in his Lamborghini.
But not even multiple misadventures in his super car had prepared the Chelsea defender for the stunt that Kai Havertz pulled on him on Sunday afternoon at the Emirates.
There were a lot of beautiful moments of skill and drama in the Premier League this weekend and I’m thinking mainly of Cody Gakpo’s two assists for Liverpool against Ipswich, Ainsley Maitland-Niles’ equaliser for Everton against Manchester United and Josh King’s turn that bamboozled Chris Richards at Craven Cottage in the build-up to Fulham’s second goal against Crystal Palace.
But Havertz won the prize for his magic trick in north London. Christos Tzolis played the ball in to him on the edge of the Chelsea area and Havertz shaped to control it. At the last second, he ignored it instead and let it run into the path of Martin Odegaard.
Poor Fofana looked as if he had been hypnotised by the brilliance of it. While he was sleeping, Odegaard danced in and slammed the ball past Emi Martinez for Arsenal’s winner.
Chelsea will not be the last team to be left in a trance by Arsenal like that this season. It is very early in the campaign but Mikel Arteta’s team already looks like an upgrade on the side that just held off Manchester City to win the title for the first time in 22 years. Last season, wracked with tension, they crawled over the line. This season, their play is infused with joie de vivre.
Arsenal’s Kai Havertz was in oustanding form at the Emirates on Sunday, producing one of the moments of the weekend with his delightful dummy against Chelsea
The piece of brilliance allowed Martin Odegaard to score the decisive second goal in a 2-1 win
They are going to be mighty hard to derail. And I don’t just mean this season. I mean for the rest of the decade. Now they have learned how to win, they look like a team that may just keep on winning.
Things can change quickly in football but this looks like the beginning of a dynasty at Arsenal. This looks like the beginning of a period of dominance, led by Arteta.
Perhaps that is disrespectful to Manchester City. They have not gone away. But there are too many variables with City. Will Enzo Maresca be an effective replacement for Pep Guardiola? Doubtful.
Will Enzo Fernandez get close to justifying the absurd £125million fee City paid for him? Highly doubtful. Will the weight of the 115 charges of financial impropriety ranged against the club start to take its toll? Will the judgment finally come this season? Will they be found innocent or guilty?
Arsenal do not face any of those complications. Maybe ‘serene’ is the wrong word to apply to a team that runs to the vibe of unadulterated intensity set by its manager but Arteta’s 2026-27 side looks smooth and assured. If its tone last season was set by the combativeness of Gabriel and the relentless excellence of Declan Rice, this season feels as if it may be defined by the nuance of Odegaard and Havertz.
That’s the other thing with this Arsenal side: some were underwhelmed by their dealings in the summer window, even if they bought proven, seasoned, top-class Premier League quality in Ezri Konsa and Bruno Guimaraes. And added Tzolis, too. But that’s only the half of it. Arsenal have acquired three other new players.
There were long periods last season when, because of injuries they were all dealing with, it felt as if Havertz, Odegaard and Bukayo Saka were not really there. In the crunch, much of the burden fell on Gabriel and William Saliba and David Raya and, particularly, Rice. But now the cavalry’s back.
Odegaard seems rejuvenated by the World Cup, where he starred in Norway’s exuberant run to the quarter-finals. He is playing like a dream this season. He is playing with elan and confidence and desire. His goal in the Community Shield, when he sat down Gianluigi Donnarumma with a delicious feint, was the first indication of the change that has come over him.
Havertz looks like a new player, too. When he joined Chelsea from Bayer Leverkusen in 2020, many German commentators described him as a ‘generational talent’. I’ve never quite seen that, even though he scored the winner for Chelsea against City in one Champions League final and added another for Arsenal in last season’s defeat in the final, on penalties, by Paris Saint-Germain.
Odegaard has been a player reborn this season and seems rejuvenated by the World Cup, where he starred in Norway’s run to the quarter-finals
It was rare last season for Arsenal to have Bukayo Saka (left), Havertz (second right) and Odegaard (right) on the pitch at the same time
But now I’m starting to see it. Havertz gives this Arsenal side an entirely different dimension to the way they looked when they were playing with Viktor Gyokeres as their spearhead last season. Gyokeres was a blunt force but Havertz brings style and guile and intelligence. If he can stay fit, he will make a huge difference to Arsenal’s season.
And Saka? Well, the importance of Saka does not need any explanation any more. He was also dogged by injury last season and he also looks like a player keen to make up for what he missed.
The hunger he showed to score the winner at Villa Park last Monday night was a sign of that. Before the campaign started, he was my tip for Footballer of the Year. I don’t see any reason to amend that.
There will be slip-ups and there will be stumbles. There always are during the course of a season. But when they come, Arsenal will be even better equipped to deal with them. They look formidable. They look like a dynasty forming.
DYER DELIGHT AS SOUTHEND WIN A THRILLER
By the time Southend United played Yeovil Town at Roots Hall early on Saturday afternoon, footage of Southend boss Kieron Dyer squeezing as many Michael Jackson song titles as he could into the pre-match press conference for charity had gone viral. Bad, Thriller and Billie Jean all got mentions. I was worried he might have made himself a hostage to fortune when Southend went 2-0 down in their National League fixture.
‘You weren’t the only one thinking that,’ Dyer said when I spoke to him on Sunday. ‘After they scored their second goal, the Yeovil players started doing the Jacko Moonwalk. I was looking at them thinking, “You boys might have gone a bit early with that”.’
He was right about that. Dyer and his team had the last laugh. Southend scored three goals in the last 24 minutes to win the game 3-2. Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough, as somebody once sang.
