THEO Walcott can feel Arsenal's confidence improving and believes yesterday's hammering of north London rivals Tottenham showed their growing credentials.
Arsene Wenger's men trailed to Emmanuel Adebayor's early goal at the Emirates Stadium, but after the Arsenal old boy was sent off, they roared back to win 5-2. Walcott, who rounded off the victory late on, said: "We showed people how good we are today. It'll give us tremendous spirit, and we've got a lot of players back to fitness and everybody's very confident."
The dismissal of Adebayor, for a studs-up challenge on Santi Cazorla was undoubtedly crucial, but Walcott backed referee Howard Webb's decision.
"I didn't really see it, but I think he did go in quite two-footed and the referee made that decision," the England international added. Tottenham manager Andre Villas-Boas accepted Adebayor's red card was justified, but was reluctant to be too hard on the striker.
"There was no intention to do any harm," the Portuguese said. "I think the sending-off determined the game, but the referee made the right decision."
Having gone 4-1 down on the hour mark, Spurs pulled a goal back through Gareth Bale and both the Wales star and Jermain Defoe had opportunities to further eat into the deficit.
Villas-Boas added: "I'm very, very proud of the team. We had chances for 4-3 and if it had gone to only a one-goal difference, we could have gone all the way." Privately, however, he would surely concede that Adebayor's challenge – seven minutes after he gave Spurs the lead – amounted to a moment of madness.
Snubbed by his former team-mates in the tunnel, the Togolese's every touch was booed by the home fans, but he delivered the perfect riposte with the opening strike.
His joy, though, was short-lived after he was handed a straight red for the horrific tackle on Cazorla.
Tottenham struggled then to cope with the numerical disadvantage, and it only took a few minutes for Per Mertesacker to equalise.
Lukas Podolski's strike, and Olivier Giroud's fifth goal in his last five games gave Arsenal a comfortable two-goal cushion by half-time. Tottenham fared slightly better in the second half, but their only reward came through Bale's consolation after Cazorla killed the contest.
To add insult to injury, Walcott grabbed a deserved goal in injury-time to make the score the same as the 5-2 win that Arsenal used as a springboard for their Champions League assault last season.
The result means Arsenal jump above Tottenham to sixth place in the Barclays Premier League, while Spurs have now suffered four successive defeats under Villas-Boas, who will have questions to answer about why he decided to play Adebayor if there were doubts about whether the striker could keep a lid on his emotions.
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