Tottenham 0:1 Arsenal: Gunners won “like a Mourinho team”

Although Arsenal played solidly without Rice in midfield, they lacked Odegaard’s creative flair and composure on the ball.

“It’s difficult to compare him and Trossard because they are very different players,” explained Walcott.

“For me, Trossard is probably the club’s best finisher – but Odegaard is the conductor, the one who makes everything work and ensures that everyone in the team does their best. He even initiates the defensive pressing.”

“Ethan Nwaneri, who came on late in the second half, has some similarities as a player but at 17 he is still very young and is still developing and learning.

“In time, he could be the one to take over Odegaard’s role when he is unavailable, but whoever comes, it will be difficult to replace him.

“At the moment I feel like they have to play differently when he’s not in the team, but we saw on Sunday that it can work.”

It certainly helps that Arsenal always pose such a threat from set pieces and have scored more goals (23) than any other Premier League team since the start of last season.

“That’s also the reason why these coaches were brought to the clubs,” said Walcott. “But the key is the time they dedicate to these situations every day.”

“When I was playing, you only practiced set pieces the day before the game, but Arsenal do it all week. When I watched them in pre-season, they did it even then. They are so important that they started this process in the summer rather than getting the players fit first.

“They think that makes the difference in certain games and when you have players of the calibre of Gabriel and Saliba, of course you want to use them. That was the case with Mourinho’s teams too – Terry was always a big threat.”

“You hear strikers like Alan Shearer and Wayne Rooney talk about how much time they spend every day after training concentrating on their finishing, so it’s become like second nature to them. This kind of repetition works when practising set pieces too, and that’s Arsenal’s reward.”