With 10 minutes to go in yesterday's game, and the Arsenal crowd growing pretty restless with the wastefulness of their side in front of goal, the Spanish midfielder ghosted into the Manchester City penalty area to smack an Alexander Helb pass past Kasper Schmeichel from a tight angle on the right.

Predictably enough, the place erupted and while you wouldn't deny Arsenal their victory, Sven-Goran Eriksson will feel that his side had defended, and indeed played, well enough to earn a point.

Richard Dunne and Micah Richards, much like last weekend against Manchester United, were absolutely outstanding at the centre of City's defensive barrier and if the pair continue to defend like that over the course of the season, Sven's team will do just fine.

As for Arsenal, it was the same old story with them yesterday. There's no question that had they a fox-inthe-box in their side, a genuine goal poacher, or even a decent penalty taker, they would have won by at least two goals, no matter how good Dunne and Micah were in getting in the way of what the home side threw at them. There were numerous examples of their extreme profligacy, particularly in a first half in which they played some super football.

On 36 minutes, Fabregas slid a ball across the City sixyard box that most strikers in the Premier League would have killed for. Robin Van Persie, however, was holding back waiting for the drag back and by the time he had read his midfielder's intentions, he'd missed the cross by half a yard. Five minutes later Van Persie himself, playing the role of Fabregas on the edge of the box, skimmed another delicious ball across the City goal but this time Emmanuel Adebayor simply stood with his hands on his hips despairing that the ball hadn't been pulled back for him.

Alexander Hleb completed the trilogy of indecision just before the break when he decided to pass to no-one in particular rather than shoot after Schmeichel had, not for the first time, made a complete hash of a cross.

But all that's not to say that Manchester City were continually manning the trenches.

Martin Petrov, their impressively direct leftwinger, crashed two shots over the Arsenal bar early on, while Emile Mpenza completely missed his kick when clear on goal on 19 minutes.

At the start of the second half, Adebayor saw a shot from inside the box deflected wide of Schmeichel's goal but City remained dangerous on the break.

Petrov skimmed an 18yard drive just the wrong side of the post on 57 minutes and, right on the hour mark, Mpenza should have given his side the lead but his goal-bound shot was blocked impressively by Manuel Almunia.

There was a general murmuring of dissatisfaction around the Emirates after that Mpenza effort and things hardly got better after the home side were awarded a penalty on 67 minutes.

Man City will argue that Richards's challenge on Hleb was perfectly legal but it mattered little when Schmeichel dived to his left to save Van Persie's poorly struck effort with his shins.

Chances don't come much better than that but thankfully for Arsenal, Fabregas remembered his role just in time to deny City both their unbeaten record and their fourth clean sheet in a row.