For a few glorious moments, at around 4.45pm on Sunday afternoon, the dream was alive in north London. Or, to be more accurate, the supporters and players of Arsenal believed the dream was alive. At the speed of sound, the most thrilling of rumours had spread: 2-2 at City.
Within the stands, Arsenal fans screamed towards the skies and held up two fingers on each hand. 2-2 at City. Takehiro Tomiyasu had just scored for Arsenal, equalising for his team after Everton’s fortunate opener, and the Emirates Stadium rumbled with uncontainable excitement. 2-2 at City.
Martin Odegaard, the Arsenal captain, had spent much of the first half attempting to whip up the home crowd. He had been whirring his arms and circling his hands, calling for more energy and more noise from the fans. Now, all of a sudden, the dream was alive and he was pleading for calm. He had no hope of getting it, of course. After all, it was 2-2 at City.
Except, it soon became clear, it wasn’t 2-2 at City. Somehow the news had spread, and on days like this nothing could ever travel faster than good news. But it was not news – not accurate news anyway – and it was not real. The dream, it eventually became clear, was not quite as alive as the Emirates had believed.
It was a wild moment on a wild afternoon of Premier League football. For those in north London, it triggered memories of similar scenes at White Hart Lane more than a decade ago, when Tottenham Hotspur supporters celebrated a “goal” elsewhere that simply had not been scored. In the battle for Champions League qualification, Sir Alan Sugar had wrongly tweeted that Newcastle had struck against Arsenal.
This time, in the red corner of the capital, there was no obvious explanation for the fake news. The most likely cause is that it was an issue of timing, with Tomiyasu’s goal arriving at almost exactly the same moment that Mohammed Kudus scored for West Ham United to make it 2-1 against Manchester City.
Kudus struck in the 42nd of that match, while Tomiyasu scored in the 43rd minute for Arsenal. Some supporters might have been aware of West Ham’s goal before Tomiyasu struck, while others might have caught up later. Either way, the flow of emotions went as follows: delight, confusion, despair.