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LONDON -- The bad old days, those palpitation-inducing, brain-frying nights when Premier League leaders Arsenal were doing all they could to turn a title challenge into a waking nightmare, are back in north London. For one night only, the Emirates Stadium was transported back to the days of a delirium masquerading as destiny.

That Arsenal were not good enough to win the title, frittering away points by losing their cool against mid-table opposition, leaving it later than a real champion would have in beating bottom-third fodder, allowing themselves to be riled into errors by Southampton, West Ham, and, of course, Brentford.

Now, Arsenal were supposed to be better than this. They had been better this over the last six weeks, the Premier League's best team blowing away the field. 

Frankly, they had been better for 45 minutes and the bulk of first half added time before Aaron Ramsdale delivered a devastating reprise to 2022-23, taking too long to get the ball out from under his feet. Yoane Wissa stole in to punish an error just as Carlos Alcaraz and Lisandro Martinez had last season and Wissa himself had this. Although Thomas Frank would be the first to tell you that if Wissa keeps forcing errors from Ramsdale, that might be less the fault of the goalkeeper than excellent pressing from his forward, as he told the Arsenal man at the final whistle.

"Ramsdale doesn't deserve that now he'll be criticized for making a mistake," said the Brentford boss. "It was unbelievable pressure from Wissa. If you see the way he accelerated, that could have happened to David [Raya]. I know David very well, love David. It would happen to him as well. It was fantastic pressure."

A Ramsdale mistake or moment of excellence from Wissa set the stage for a second half where Arsenal reflected their goalkeeper's skittishness even as the man himself set about making amends, saving impressively from Ivan Toney and Nathan Collins. 

"He did exactly what he is," said Mikel Arteta. "Which is a person with huge personality and courage, very determined. Errors are part of football. It's how you react to it, especially for the keepers which is probably the most difficult position. He did so in an amazing way.

"I'm not surprised because the whole team and the whole stadium was behind him. He has earned that respect and admiration. We really wanted to win for him." 

You could feel that sense from Arsenal that they could not allow this season to fall apart in such a familiar fashion, the perma-outraged fringe of social media waiting to claim Ramsdale had thrown the title away again. Time seemed to rush away from the hosts. Every move went too fast, the slow grind that had led to Declan Rice's opener off Ben White's cross evaporating in the desperation to make amends.

In the first 40 minutes of the second half, Arsenal created only two chances of note, Gabriel rising highest to meet a corner that was cleared off the line by Vitaly Janelt and Mark Flekken before Rice crashed an effort against the crossbar. Increasingly the nine figures Arsenal invested into their record signing look like a bargain. Even in the lulls, Rice drove Arsenal on, bringing with him an authority that meant for once Brentford were not able to win all the physical duels.

When Arsenal's title challenge hit what in retrospect looks like its mortal blow last season, there was hardly a duel that Brentford did not win. Perhaps the Premier League's most muscular team, the Bees won over 70 percent of their aerials in a contentious 1-1 draw. This time out that number edged back towards parity and while Brentford might shade that particular metric in totality, the flicks that really mattered came off Arsenal heads.

Notably off those who did not have the lived experience of last season's collapses rattling through their minds. First came Rice, then another late winner from Kai Havertz, the man widely derided as a flop in his first few months in north London but whose brace of late winners against Brentford alone goes a fair way to repaying the £65 million Arsenal gave Chelsea. Since Arteta hurled him into the tumult late on at the Gtech Community Stadium in November, Havertz has scored seven Premier League goals, a tally only bettered by Bukayo Saka, whose nine includes two penalties.

After their experiences with William Gallas, Willian and Petr Cech, Arsenal fans are more than a little reticent when it comes to Chelsea imports. Now they are head over heels, his chant firmly established in the firmament of awful pop songs adapted by a jubilant fanbase. Whether he should have been on the pitch to convert White's cross was up for debate, Frank convinced he should have got a second yellow for a 66th-minute dive in the penalty area. How delighted Arsenal supporters are that he was, a scenario that even Arteta could not have foreseen earlier in the season.

"If somebody told me after the first two or three months that the whole stadium would be singing his song with that passion, with that feeling with that chemistry, I would have found it hard to believe," said the Arsenal manager. That's what happens to good people. He's an exceptional player. 

"When he starts to score goals like this and everything starts to flow people feel more connected with him. They see his work rate, they see his intelligence, they see how he plays for the team and how he's contributing. It's impossible not to love him."

Moments like Saturday's will certainly go some way to engendering that affection but they may be rather infrequent. Arsenal have been good enough for long enough that leaving it late against Brentford feels rather more like a blast from the past than a reversion to the mean. After all, they had been as impressive in the first 45 minutes as when they battered Sheffield United or Burnley even with a less authoritative presence setting the tone at the back. They are a better team this season than last, in no small part down to the strength and quality of Rice and Havertz.

Still, it helps to know that when the occasion really calls for it, Arsenal can reprise the hits from yesteryear.