Arsenal 2-2 Manchester City: Danny Welbeck makes debut but Wilshere shines

Jack Wilshere steals limelight debutant Danny Welbeck.

The afternoon was supposed to be about one England player, but it turned out to be all about another.

Danny Welbeck has been the week’s most talked-about footballer. He’s been held up as evidence that Manchester United have abandoned their traditions, scored two goals in Basle and hailed as the transfer bargain of the summer.

It was always going to be a lot of baggage to carry into his Arsenal debut and so it proved.

For Jack Wilshere, however, this was redemption day.

After a promising stint as an anchorman in Switzerland, here he was running the midfield against the Premier League Champions, scoring and making goals just as he promised to do when he was English football’s great white hope.

He may have fallen off that pedestal in the last couple of years, but on this evidence, Jack’s back!

The Arsenal playmaker scored a peach of an equaliser and set up Alexis Sanchez’s volley that looked like giving Arsenal all three points.

But in the end City pegged it back with a Martin Demichelis header seven minutes from time and the points were justly shared.

Welbeck’s afternoon might have been very different had taken his one big chance in the 12th minute.

He did almost everything right when he seized onto a loose back pass by David Silva, beating Joe Hart easily with the chip, only to see the ball strike the foot of the post and rebound straight to the keeper.

It was one thing watching Welbeck in an Arsenal shirt but something else again to see Frank Lampard in City sky blue. It was like seeing Mick Jagger fronting The Beatles.

The former Chelsea stalwart had not kicked a ball since England’s final game in Brazil ten weeks ago, and he lasted just 45 minutes.

His lack of match fitness contributed to City having all sorts of problems in the early stages.

Wilshere’s driving runs, the trickery of Sanchez and Welbeck’s movement had Vincent Kompany and his fellow defenders working overtime.Bookings for fouls by Lampard then Pablo Zabaleta in a three minute spell told the story of just how stretched Manuel Pellegrini’s team was.

But after 28 minutes of pressure, Jesus Navas collected the ball on the right touchline, sprinted 30 yards and picked out Sergio Aguero, who applied the controlled finish.

It was the classic sucker punch goal, Arsenal’s bubble was burst and City might have extended their lead when Silva wriggled through but he was thwarted by Wojciech Szczesny.

Former Gunner Gael Clichy almost undid them again just before the hour mark when he sprinted on to Aguero’s return pass but chipped the ball wide of the far post.

It seemed the game was turning irrevocably City’s way, but Arsenal tapped into their recently discovered strength of character and hauled themselves back into it.

It was a typical Arsenal goal, born of slick inter-passing and finished exquisitely by Wilshere after a wonderful ball from Aaron Ramsey.

And once back in it, their only thought was to win it.

Eleven minutes later Wilshere made sure he was first to Kompany’s headed clearance, nodding on to Sanchez before the Chilean scored with a magnificent volley.

But this is Arsenal and the old soft centre is never far from the surface. And seven minutes from time City exposed it in the simplest of ways.

Substitute Aleksandar Kolarov slung over a cross from the left, Demichelis was unchallenged and his header rocketed into the top corner despite Szczesny and Mathieu Flamini’s efforts on the line.

And, in the end, the Gunners could have lost it twice in stoppage time! Laurent Koscielny hit his own post as he tried to stop Edin Dzeko reaching a Silva pass, then Nasri was flagged offside as he tapped in after Szczesny had pushed away Dzeko’s shot.