With transfer uncertainty surrounding the club, it was good to see an improvement on the pitch as Arsenal beat Crystal Palace 4-1 at the Emirates.
The Gunners blew their London rivals away with four goals inside the opening 25 minutes and Nacho Monreal in particular was excellent during that dominant spell with his header and two assists.
2018 hasn't been great for us in the Premier League so far because after the credible 2-2 draw against Chelsea, we lost at Bournemouth, as well as being eliminated from the FA Cup by Nottingham Forest. So this result came as a big relief and the first-half display especially was a lot more like how we should be playing.
If, and it's a big if, we can pull off some of the rumoured transfers and contracts then this month might not be so bad after all, although we are still too far off the pace in the league and this can't be ignored.
It is looking increasingly likely that Alexis Sanchez will move to Manchester United in a swap deal that will see Henrikh Mkhitaryan join us. Although the Armenian midfielder is a decent player and could be a good fit, it is obviously disappointing to be losing a player of Sanchez's calibre. Maybe Arsene Wenger should have done more to tie him down to a contract before the season started, but you also can't force a player to stay. I'll still be sad to see him go, but we proved against Palace we can fire in the goals without him. What is more encouraging is the news that Mesut Ozil and Jack Wilshere appear to look likely to sign new contracts at the club. The situations could totally change before the end of the month and it is hard to tell whether it will happen, but at least we have hope.
The transfer rumours of Borussia Dortmund striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang coming to Arsenal appear to be strengthening and if we pull this one off it would be superb. It still wouldn't fully make up for selling Sanchez to a rival, but he is a great player and it would help soften the blow. I am normally an optimist, but I won't believe this one until it is officially confirmed by the club as we've been through this before and I don't want to get my hopes up yet. It would be one hell of a signing if we can secure it though!
Back to the match and it took just six minutes for Arsenal to open the scoring. Alex Iwobi's shot was tipped over the crossbar by Palace goalkeeper Wayne Hennessey. From the resulting Granit Xhaka corner Monreal broke free of his marker to head home.
Monreal was involved again as the Gunners doubled their advantage four minutes later. Palace failed to clear their lines and Monreal ran into the box before passing for Iwobi to score from close range.
Three minutes later and it was 3-0 and Arsenal were in dreamland. Why can't we be this clinical all the time? From another Xhaka corner, Monreal put a low ball back in for Laurent Koscielny to poke home an easy finish.
It was excellent to see Alexandre Lacazette back among the goals and hopefully his 22nd-minute strike can be the start of a good scoring run for the France international. A great team move ended with Wilshere passing for Ozil, whose backheel set up Lacazette to place a low strike into the bottom corner. It could have been five soon after had Iwobi not shot straight at Hennessey.
At the other end, Bakary Sakho shrugged off the defence before shooting straight at Petr Cech in the Arsenal goal.
Monreal was having a superb first half, but the defender was unfortunately forced off with a hamstring problem after 34 minutes. The post-match comments from Wenger indicate the Spanish full-back was only taken off as a precaution, which is a relief.
Monreal's replacement Ainsley Maitland-Niles has impressed in some of his performances this season, but he far too easily gifted possession to Palace shortly before half-time. Fortunately for Arsenal it didn't lead to a goal as Wilfried Zaha's shot deflected wide.
Crystal Palace wasted a great chance to score their first goal of the afternoon on the hour mark. Christian Benteke latched onto a fine pass from Sakho, but Cech spread himself well and excellently blocked the shot.
Arsenal tried to add to their lead in the second half, but Mohamed Elneny saw his shot parried by Hennessey, while Hector Bellerin's volley was later blocked by the defence and went behind for a corner.
Palace managed to grab a consolation goal 13 minutes from time after Maitland-Niles again casually gave the ball away, and from the attacking move that followed Palace won a corner. From Yohan Cabaye's resulting corner, Benteke headed the ball on and Milivojevic excellently controlled the ball with his chest before firing a volley past Cech.
Arsenal nearly went down the other end to restore their four-goal advantage, but Lacazette slipped as he shot which allowed Hennessy to block the shot. The French striker had another chance from the follow-up, but it was at too nice a height for the goalkeeper, who made a comfortable save.
Lacazette was also denied in stoppage time when he went down in the box - the Palace player appeared to get the ball and the man, but there didn't look to be too much in it and nothing was given.
OPPOSITION VIEW
Crystal Palace fan Chris Want wasn't too worried by the result as he doesn't think it will define their season.
"Palace have been on form recently, but the Emirates is always a difficult place to go," said Want. "Arsenal blew us out of the water in the first 20 minutes.
"We improved after half-time, but it was too little too late. I felt as a Palace fan that with our recent good form, and Arsenal's recent poor form, that we had a chance, but Arsenal completely outclassed us.
"Our season won't be defined by these type of games though, thankfully."
MY FINAL THOUGHTS
The result, along with Tottenham's 1-1 draw at Southampton, means we are now three points behind our fifth-placed bitter rivals.
We are five points behind Liverpool so if we are to have any hope of a top-four finish there is no margin for error and we can't be dropping any more points. Even if we were to achieve fourth, it wouldn't really be good enough as in too many games we have been below par.
Our last league game of January sees us travel to Swansea, but before we can even start thinking about that we must focus all our attentions on the League Cup semi-final second leg.
Yes, admittedly it isn't all that great a competition, but it is still silverware and we need to take it very seriously. Winning any trophy is a good feeling and any win against Chelsea is always sweet, just like any defeat to them hurts. This isn't just about the cup, it is about bragging rights over Chelsea and we need to make sure we beat them.
We may not have got an away goal, but we also stopped them scoring and have home advantage with the tie locked at 0-0 going into the second leg. Like us Chelsea scored four in their last match so both defences will need to be on top form. It is a hard one to call, but let's hope we can do it.
COME ON YOU GUNNERS
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