Arsenal 4-0 Aston Villa: Premier League match report

This has been one of the strangest seasons in recent memory for Arsenal. It's almost certainly been the least enjoyable one since I started watching this team. And yet, here we are. Here we are. We should have won the league, but we didn't. We absolutely should have finished behind Tottenham Hotspur for the first time since I was in elementary school, but we didn't. Second place isn't a trophy, but it's the best league finish we've had 2005. And we're all disappointed by it.

The match was somewhat strange, too. Olivier Giroud capped off a dominant Arsenal start with a goal five minutes in, and while Arsenal kept the pressure up for most of the first half no more goals were on the cards. Aston Villa, on the other hand, were barely present. They created one, maybe two chances, but may as well have stayed home for the most part. After halftime that changed somewhat – they found their way back into the game, though not into the back of the net.

But with ten minutes left, Giroud struck twice quickly to ice the game. From there, it was a formality, and we got one last gift – a fourth goal as time wound down, which will probably be an own goal but in my heart goes to Mikel Arteta, who's probably played his last game for Arsenal.

We'll unpack this all later, but Spurs' 5-1 dismantling at Newcastle (against ten men!) and this win mean that Arsenal finish above Spurs again, for about the millionth time in a row. This is probably the most hilarious St. Totteringham's Day in a while, but be nice to our friends at Cartilage Free Captain. If I hear of trolling, you're banned here. Celebrate as you will, but confine it to this web space.

Happy offseason, everyone.