It felt like it was the last they will see of him as David de Gea disappeared into the Old Trafford tunnel, a lap of honour complete, the ground reverberating to the sound of his name.
The man paid to repel shots has halted Manchester United’s decline. He has stopped things getting any worse and, in the process, been the catalyst for revival.
He has saved at least 10 points this season, maybe 15.
Perhaps, had he been able to complete this game, he would have saved another two. Instead victory escaped United eight minutes – but four months – into Victor Valdes’s career at the club.
He was wrong footed when Theo Walcott’s cross shot took a sizeable deflection off Tyler Blackett.
It certainly did not rank as a goalkeeping error but the temptation was to wonder if De Gea, had he not been hamstrung, would have added to his compendium of stupendous saves.
Instead Walcott rescued a point and Arsenal preserved the status quo with a scoreline to satisfy them, which meant that third place and automatic qualification for the Champions League is almost certainly theirs.
Yet it was evident that this fixture has been downgraded.
For years United against Arsenal was the top two, the dominant duo, but now they rank as the second pair, trailing the nouveaux riches forces of Chelsea and Manchester City.
De Gea may experience El Clasico in Real Madrid’s colours next season, whereas the English equivalent felt low key, lacking the intensity, the urgency and the sense that irresistible force was meeting immovable object.
It was emblematic that 10 years after the two captains were Roy Keane and Patrick Vieira, the respective sides were led out by Chris Smalling and Per Mertesacker.
The match began with Vieira’s name echoing around Old Trafford, the Arsenal fans providing a reminder of past titanic battles.
This highlighted flaws, rather than force, with Arsenal curiously timid in the first half, as though forgetting they won on United soil in the FA Cup as recently as March, while remembering their previous seven league trips to Old Trafford had only yielded one point.
United had a virtuoso display of Phil Jones’s brand of comical commitment.
They were the better team for an hour, despite playing with 10 men, because Radamel Falcao was a passenger, a shadow of his former self.
He left the Old Trafford pitch, almost certainly for the final time, with a contrite wave that seemed to acknowledge he has been a let down. The standing ovation he was granted when replaced was, like his £265,000-a-week contract (Dh1.53m), an exercise in generosity.
If the shame for United fans is the probable loss of De Gea, the consolation is that they will not have to witness any more of Falcao’s painful decline.
Lacking a striker of note, they relied on midfielders to compensate and two did: a sprightly Ashley Young crossing for a clinical Ander Herrera to open the scoring.
Young’s season is a triumph of functionality. He has exuded reliability and if United aspire to more, as the signing of the wunderkind Memphis Depay proves, it has nonetheless been effective.
So, too, Marouane Fellaini’s ungainly but forceful approach.
It is unlikely a title-winning team can be constructed around both, but each has made a considerable contribution to United’s renaissance.
In contrast, Walcott has been a bit-part player in Arsenal’s campaign and ranks among the litany of players, De Gea included, whose contract expires in 2016 and whose future is shrouded in speculation. He may not want the role of impact substitute, but he prospered as one.
Arsenal had taken an hour to trouble a goalkeeper – De Gea, before his removal with the injury that could deprive him of a farewell at Hull next week – but they have illustrated their powers of recovery.
The match was a microcosm of a campaign. Eighth in November and off the pace, they have rallied and have a platform for progress.
If United are deprived of De Gea, they will need to find such a solid base.
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