LONDON -- Depth is nice, especially when you have as much of it as Arsenal, two deep in every position, able to shade an injury at left back by simply shunting their England international center midfielder into the other position where he has excelled against some of the best in the world.
Ultimately, though Mikel Arteta can be bequeathed as many options as Andrea Berta can rustle up, there's no way that you are not going to feel the absence of a fit and in-form Bukayo Saka and Martin Odegaard. That much was clear as Lille became the latest side to be overwhelmed by what Arteta likes to term his finishers, a role that his substitutes certainly lived up to in the final 25 minutes at the Emirates Stadium.
The breakthrough had just come when Arteta deployed Saka, Odegaard and Kai Havertz, a clipped finish by Jurrien Timber bringing relief to an antsy ground that had seen too many promising attacks die just outside the penalty area. Arsenal had been too slow, too desynchronised, too often in each other's way. It said everything about the quartet that had started the game that right back Timber looked as likely to get a goal as any of them.
Noni Madueke was very capable of getting the ball into good positions, less effective when he got there. Mikel Merino deployed the skill that makes him so impactful as a substitute -- a patient assessment of his options before picking the right one -- to slow down attacks. Eberechi Eze ran into blind alleys. Viktor Gyokeres? Well it was another game without a shot for the Swede, whose 1.9 penalty box touches per 90 is less than half those of Timber. The only players who average fewer are center backs, defensive midfielders and goalkeepers.
Bruno Guimaraes tried to win it himself and occasionally looked like he might, denied a penalty early in the second half and spurning the best chance of the first half when he diverted Timber's cutback just wide of the near post. The Brazilian aside this was leaden-footed stuff, at least until those substitutes added some levity to proceedings. The first attack after the changes and Arsenal drove through the gears, Odegaard and Guimaraes combining to find Saka down the right. His first-time cross off his nominally weaker right foot found Eze in stride to stroke home.
Here were the stars making the fringe guys look even better. In the 20 minutes after the triple change, Eze took three shots, one more than he had in the preceding 65. The space he had had to craft for himself beforehand was now there for Arsenal's No.10 to exploit, the service impeccable.
A third came when the big three of Arsenal's attack combined themselves: Odegaard, Saka, Odegaard again through to Havertz, who rolled the ball across for Saka to finish. It is now eight games in all competitions for Saka with a big chance, double his previous best. His finishing might have been wayward before today, but having an elite progressor and creator getting into so many scoring positions augurs incredibly well for Arsenal.
So does what Arteta got from several of his fringe attackers tonight. While the abiding takeaway is that Arsenal's best attackers are better than the rest, it is worth noting that with Madueke, Merino and Eze leading the way, this team was still good enough to hold a Champions League opponent at arms' length, and that Madueke himself did eventually get an assist. This wasn't the rescue job that Guimaraes drove against Leeds, instead it was Arteta's best players getting half an hour-ish to overwhelm an opponent who had been ground down, even as Arsenal struggled in the final third. Saka and company really only needed five minutes.
