LONDON — It is the sort of gambler’s call that wins titles. It is also the sort of call that many believe Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta is incapable of making.
And yet, on 72 minutes with his team laboring badly at 0-0 and Emirates Stadium steadily descending into desperation, Arteta turned to 16-year-old Max Dowman for inspiration.
“Probably in my head I had a gut feeling,” said Arteta. “Yesterday he was training in the last few days and I had a gut feeling that it was a moment for him.
“Probably because he doesn’t seem to be fazed by the occasion or the moment or the context or the opponent. He just plays so naturally. He makes decisions to make things happen and what he delivered was incredible.”
Incredible was right. Dowman, on his seventh senior appearance and just his third Premier League game, changed the course of the 2-0 win. He may have changed the course of the entire season.
In the 89th minute, as Everton backed off, he swung over a devilish cross to the back post. Toffees goalkeeper Jordan Pickford had not put a foot wrong all day, but he could not reach Dowman’s delivery, allowing Piero Hincapié to meet the ball with his knee and steer it into the path of Viktor Gyökeres for a tap-in.
Mounting rage gave way to relief, which became unadulterated joy minutes later when Arsenal cleared an Everton corner, Dowman beat Vitaliy Mykolenko and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall — the latter as if he wasn’t there — to race clear on goal with half the pitch completely unoccupied as Pickford was stranded upfield.
In the maelstrom of noise all around him, Dowman drifted forward and passed the ball into the empty net to secure three priceless points and become the youngest goalscorer in Premier League history, aged 16 years and 73 days. Having already become the youngest ever player to feature in the Champions League, he is now also the youngest player ever to score for Arsenal.
History-making moments sometimes only crystallize with the benefit of hindsight. This felt totemic in real time, triggering a rare Jürgen Klopp-style fist pump celebration from Arteta afterwards, shortly before eulogising about the teenager who energized his faltering side.
“I think he created a different energy in the stadium,” said Arteta. “It’s not only the goal that he scored. I think he changed the game.
“Every time he got the ball, he made things happen. It looked like we were more of a threat. To do that at that age, in this context, with this pressure, it is just not normal.
“[I said to him] ‘go and do your thing and win us the game.’ And the same with Viktor and to [Gabriel] Martinelli. I said these are the moments in the season when something special has to happen, and he knows he has the ability, which I have to give him the opportunity, and he will deliver.
“For me, [Dowman’s goal] felt like 45 seconds [long]. And I think it was really special because you could sense that he was ‘Ooh’ building up, building up and you see there’s no goalie there, it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen.
“And everybody was lifting. It was incredible. It was so loud, so energetic. What a moment.”
Three of his five substitutes combined for the opening goal and Gyökeres has now, finally, scored against a team in the top half of the table.
But the focus will inevitably fall on Dowman. Arsenal have been keen to keep him under wraps, given his tender age and Arteta’s reluctance to throw him was influenced by both an understandable desire to protect a prodigious talent, but also speaks to his coaching style which favors the predictable, the reliable, the formulaic.
For long periods, Everton were comfortable with that. They should have been ahead at halftime. Dwight McNeil hit the post and had another shot somehow blocked by Riccardo Calafiori lunging hopefully at the ball. Dewsbury-Hall also went close and in the second half, Beto forced David Raya into an excellent save before substitute Thierno Barry headed fractionally wide.
Arteta tried to expand the delirious denouement beyond Dowman, citing the impact his substitutes have made all season long.
“Gabi [Magalhães], [Cristhian] Mosquera had to come in when Jurriën [Timber] was out [injured during the first half] and I think it’s been the theme of the season,” said Arteta.
“I think the impact of the finishers that the players have played is the reason why we are here, basically. And that says a lot about the people that we have in the dressing room because sometimes my decision, maybe they’re not right or they’re not fair, they take it in the right way with only one objective, which is to help the team to win.”
There remain lingering doubts about Arteta’s ability to rotate his squad effectively, especially when they look so flat for much of the game as they did here.
It is fair to argue some players are overused while others aren’t given enough time to establish a rhythm.
And yet, despite a series of stuttering performances, they remain on course in all four competitions. Dowman’s day ensures that. Time will tell if this goes into the Premier League annals alongside moments like Federico Macheda’s for Manchester United against Aston Villa in April 2009, a classic of Sir Alex Ferguson’s risk-taking genre.
But much more of this and using Dowman regularly won’t feel like a gamble at all.
