An excellent day for everyone connected to the Arsenal. Our seventh win in as many games – three different scorers, a very good performance all round – what else do we want? It’s a great sight to see us in such an elevated position. Languishing in 17th after a few games and then just after we got to the top 4, we lost a few on the trot… so to come back and win 7 out of 7 is an amazing feat.

Arsenal 3 – 0 Aston Villa

We played well, but at the same time, Villa were poor. The team line up was nearly what was predicted, but Rosicky was given the nod ahead of Ramsey and the line up was:

Szcznesy

Sagna – Djourou – Vermaelen – Gibbs

Arteta – Song

Walcott – Rosicky– Gervinho

Van Persie

Now I really don’t know where on earth Mr. Rosicky has got this new lease of life, but he has been immense in our revival, effectively keeping Ramsey out of the team. He was immense again today and he seems to have a free role which means it’s impossible to mark him for the opposition and it drags the opposition all over the place.

The first goal was scored by a very unlikely goal scorer in Kieran Gibbs – but some excellent interplay with Gervinho saw him in  good position and he hit the ball at goal and it kind out went through Shay Given – who you had to think could have done better. Of course, he did actually get much better throughout the game. How nice is it to have Gibbs in the team and having had a run of games? Awesome isn’t it? And it was 2-0 before the break after a lovely ball into the air, over the defence by Songinho, and a great finish by the man in form, Theo Walcott – 2-0 to the Arsenal.

Having had two games in 4 days, the second half would be a little tougher, and Villa bettered themselves a little, more so by the removal of Emile Heskey. The second half was tighter, we were still good, but it looked liked it was going to be goalless… that is… of course, until Mikel Arteta stepped up in stoppage time. It was a free kick, but it was dispatched into the back of the net like no other free kick has been dispatched today – MOTD baby!

Arsene spoke after the game and commented on the excellent performance of the team:

I felt it was a very dynamic, fluent performance in the first half with top technical quality. It was a controlled performance in the second half, we controlled the game and managed not to concede a goal. Our fatigue came in a bit because we gave a lot at Everton on Wednesday night to win the game. Overall I am very happy, very pleased because we managed to score goals and not concede any. We have consistency at the moment, so let’s go home and wait for the next game.

It is very important now to continue the run and look up rather than down. If we think the job is down then we’ll fall into our own trap of thinking we’ve made it. We’ve seen how quickly everything can turn around, so we need to ensure that we keep our feet on the ground, concentrate on the next game and the next game only.

With the Euro’s coming up this summer, there has been a lot of fan and media interest in Theo Walcott’s performances and after his dip in form earlier this year, many were questioning his place in the Arsenal team. But February and March have been good months for Theo and today, he showed it all – movement, tricks, passing, skill and he scored a goal. His previous few appearances have also seen quite a few assists too…

Arsene singled out Theo in his post match interview:

Theo had a very good performance and scored a great goal. You have to give him credit for that. But I would like to give credit to the pass from Song, because it is not the first time he has done that. You do not see many defensive midfielders [do that]. If you look at the assists that he has made this season, you will see that his numbers are top in Europe.

Consistency for Theo is the key, and that goes for the whole team. We’ve got QPR at Loftus Road next weekend, and we’ve seen what they’re capable after they beat Liverpool earlier this week, so we will have to be very much on top of our game…

Til tomorrow my friends, til tomorrow…