Arsene Wenger's desire to arrange his teams in formations seemingly more suited for the schoolyard than the harsh realities of professional football will always yield dividends against teams who care little about possession and space.
Here, Wenger told his players to align in a shape that convention suggested should be recorded as 4-2-3-1 but was, at times, actually an old-fashioned 4-2-4. It came against a Manchester City team almost chronically averse to hustling man and ball, and meant they departed with the gasps of an attack-sated crowd reverberating in their ears.
Denilson and Alexander Song were the holding players in Wenger's approach. Andriy Arshavin, Cesc Fabregas, Theo Walcott – particularly slick throughout – and Emmanuel Adebayor were the front four when attacking, which was for most of the game.
City had strode into the Emirates squatting snugly among their fellow mid-table occupants, 38 points to the good, and three victories ahead of the dreaded relegation-trapdoor, which is beginning to creak open.
It proved, though, little beyond cold comfort.
Instead, the north London sun shined mainly on Arsenal and, in particular, Adebayor, whose goal sack for the season had two more by afternoon's end thanks to his manager's penchant for buccaneering football.
Yet the Togo striker's reacquaintance with his team-mates after two months in Arsenal's convalescence chamber – Fabregas was also back for a first time since December, Theo Walcott a fortnight – will have been too easy a ride as far as City manager Mark Hughes is concerned.
Arsenal, of course, slip the ball forward with a velvety ease. This is hardly news, so Hughes will have been furious at the help offered by the referee as well as his errant defence.
On seven minutes the official adjudged Robinho to have fouled Bacary Sagna when the consensus was it had been a legal shoulder charge. In came the free-kick from the right, delivered by Fabregas, and out went any discipline from City. Nedum Onuoha was most culpable, deciding to leave the Togo striker alone with his header.
City's best moment came just after the half-hour. Craig Bellamy offered a reminder he was playing by involving Shaun Wright-Phillips on the right.
The England winger's pass was smartly counter-intuitive, going into the area to find Gelson Fernandes. But he could only clip the left-hand post.
Three minutes into the second half, a training ground move sealed the win. Fabregas scooped a pass over Richard Dunne and Adebayor controlled, dribbled past Given and finished.
