Declan Rice walked down the tunnel, shaking his head and muttering to himself. Arsenal had just lost valuable ground in the fight for the Premier League title, Mikel Arteta seemed never to be able to smile again and Rice seemed to be struggling to come to terms with his inability to exert any real control over the midfield.

With Arteta’s defense unable to contain the excellent Anthony Gordon and outstanding match-winner Alexander Isak on a day when Arsenal made a litany of uncharacteristic unforced errors, Eddie Howe’s team remembered how to play smart and reaped deserved rewards. After five winless Premier League games, Newcastle seems to be on the up again.

Howe used his manager’s notes in the match program to remind everyone that playing with the best teams “brings out the very best in us”. Any suggestion that this was wishful thinking was dispelled when Isak converted Gordon’s fantastic cross from the right to give Newcastle the lead in the 12th minute after slotting between Gabriel and William Saliba.

Until then, Arsenal had been the better team, but although they quickly re-established their previous dominance, they struggled to create clear-cut chances.

Admittedly, Fabian Schär was somehow able to guide Bukayo Saka’s threatening cross to safety before Lewis Hall’s brave block landed between former Newcastle midfielder Mikel Merino and a vicious volley, but Arteta’s frown suggested he wasn’t overly optimistic.

In fact, Arsenal’s defensive line wobbled a little with almost every counter-attack from Howe’s team. Presumably aware of Jurrien Timber’s preference for pushing into midfield from the left, Howe had deployed Gordon on his less favored right flank, allowing the impressive Joelinton to attack on the left.

With Gordon appearing to be a natural in a role he would never have volunteered for, Arteta’s defenders were repeatedly dragged into places they didn’t want to go, while Isak’s intelligent positioning made it clear why Arsenal’s manager had a long-standing interest Sweden’s center forward is keen on recruiting.

Arteta is also believed to be an admirer of Bruno Guimarães and that opinion would probably not have changed as he watched the Brazilian midfielder deployed at the heart of that department on a day when Italian Sandro Tonali was initially on the bench sat before finally replacing Joe Willock – persistently interrupting the visitors’ attacks and winning some clever free kicks in the process.

Kudos also to former Arsenal midfielder Willock, who, along with Guimarães and Sean Longstaff, ensured that Rice and his friends certainly didn’t go through everything on their own. Behind them, Hall, another player who had improved greatly under Howe’s coaching, shone at left-back, largely outpacing an unusually subdued Saka.

David Raya needed a decent stop to keep out a low Isak shot as Arteta began to reshuffle his team, introducing Oleksandr Zinchenko at left-back and bolstering his attacking arsenal with 17-year-old Ethan Nwaneri.

They were soon joined by Ben White and Gabriel Jesus, but apart from defending deeper and deeper as the minutes went by, Newcastle also managed to get things going so laboriously that Arsenal rarely managed to produce any convincing passing.

At some point towards the end of the second half, Pope apparently went down injured, giving his teammates a chance to regroup, but wasting time alone did not secure a resurgent Newcastle a well-deserved victory.