Arsenal made a lot of people look really stupid on Sunday when they spanked Tottenham and sent them back across north London to take a long, hard look at themselves.

Here are some standout things I noticed from the game (and before)

Mesut Ozil rumours are quick to spawn

It took less than half an hour for the first rumour to emerge that Mesut Ozil had refused to train on Saturday after being told he wouldn’t start on Sunday despite there not being a whisper of any trouble before the Arsenal team was announced.

Convenient, huh?

While it might fit certain people’s narratives to act like Mesut Ozil is a diva who likes to throw strops, he isn’t. I don’t believe for a minute that he refused to train because he was told he was dropped.

He’s a professional footballer who has made his way to the very top of the game, not some no-mark on Twitter thinking about how he’d act if he had the chance.

Questions certainly need to be asked about his fitness for the squad. He is the highest earner at the club by a distance so he needs to be a player who can be relied on.

Is he?

There’s no way Arsenal spent pre-match trying to ‘chill’

Just after the match started Unai Emery was shown crossing himself.

He knew what was coming.

Before matches under Arsene Wenger, the manager insisted that the team spend time getting into a Zenlike state, convinced that calm was the key.

But football is about passion as much as it is about anything else.

We see that with fans who will forgive a shit passionate player before they will a talented drifter.

Emery knows this. Emery knows that football is, ultimately, for the fans and the team has to give them what they want to see on the pitch.

In a derby, it is passion above all else. You do not get fired up like Arsenal were on Sunday by listening to some Tibetan chanting before the game.

Aubameyang gets it

When he sent Hugo Lloris the wrong way to score the penalty Mike Dean, MIKE DEAN! had given Arsenal, Aubameyang knew how huge that moment was.

Making no mistake he went off celebrating right in front of the Tottenham fans before urging the crowd to lift them another level.

Tottenham are the dirtiest team in the Premier League

I don’t know what touch Gary Neville thinks he saw from Rob Holding on Son because there wasn’t one. Jamie Redknapp ‘thinks’ there was ‘definite contact’ while the rest of us used our eyes to see what was actually there. Or wasn’t, as the case may be.

Like the rest of his teammates tend to do on a regular basis, Son dived at the first opportunity and was rewarded. Not only that, he then had the media try to gaslight Arsenal fans into thinking there was contact when there clearly wasn’t.

Tottenham behave like this every week and it’s ignored by the majority of the media.

They consistently put in dangerous, sly challenges designed to do nothing other than hurt while diving at a rate Tom Daley would be proud off when they need a goal.

Still, they are the media’s darlings. It makes no sense.

Mike Dean will never fail to make it about himself

https://twitter.com/ang_15s/status/1069239999399374849

https://twitter.com/raiderfra/status/1069241937931235329

Lacazette loves Welbeck so much he finished just like him

The ball might have nestled in the bottom corner where he wanted it to go (thus differentiating him from Welbeck) but the way Lacazette slipped as he took his shot before bouncing it off a defender was just pure Welbz.

I’m sure it cheered the forward up no end as he watched at home.

Unai Emery makes elite halftime subs

What can you say about a man who sees his team losing by a single goal – and playing really well – who still decides to make two big calls at halftime, not because he needs to but because he wants to?

And what does it say when those same two subs then turn the entire game around, grabbing two assists and a goal between?

I’ll tell you what it means, it means that Unai Emery is the greatest human alive.

Pundits know nothing

None gave us a chance, even Gary Neville admitted he never believed Arsenal had this sort of performance inside them.

Fans knew because we’ve been watching it build. We’ve seen what Emery has been doing and it hasn’t just been tactical.

He’s been changing how these players see the game and their role in it, he is overhauling them on every level.

And this is just the start…

Spurs players are trained to look shocked and innocent when held to account for their thuggery

Jan Vertonghen knew exactly what he was doing when he rammed his studs into Lacazette’s ankle and should have seen a straight red nevermind a second yellow.

But Vertonghen looked like he’d just been plucked from the crowd and falsely accused.

It’s a look Spurs players have all mastered as part of Pochettino’s dark arts training.

Eric Dier is the most Tottenham thing ever

Shushing the Emirates crowd after 35 minutes and then being responsible for your side conceding two goals must be one of the most Tottenham things ever seen on this planet.

Well played, Eric. You were up against some stiff competition!