A bit dicey, this one. Some of the crowd seemed to think that it was requirement not only to beat Everton, but to beat them as convincingly as Man Utd beat Fulham yesterday. Not veterans of the Graham years, I suspect!

This was not Fulham but rather an Everton side who have serious hopes to qualify for Europe this year. They're solid and hard-working, and have some craft up front too. Well, they've got Wayne Rooney for starters, and unusually he did start too.

Arsenal got the first after just 8 minutes when Henry won a corner then put it in to the near post, from the left. Richard Wright came out to punch but Cygan got his head to it first and there was no stopping his first Arsenal goal.

But from then on Arsenal never really got things flowing. Though we dominated the first half the chances were rare and didn't often trouble the keeper. And Everton looked dangerous too.

Rooney had a quiet first half, but it seemed like he'd been told to target the left at half time because he started to attack the Gio/Cygan area with venom. 20 minutes into the second half Gilberto lost the ball in midfield and Cygan backed off as Rooney approached, allowing him a free shot past Taylor and low inside the far post.

Everton were good value for the level scoreline, and Arsenal looked a bit rattled. In the end it was a route one goal against the run of play which won it for us just 8 minutes later. Taylor's hoof was flicked on by Vieira to Henry and by Henry to Bergkamp. Dennis muscled Unsworth off the ball and it fell to Vieira who slammed it home from close range. There were some complaints from Everton and from the other end of the pitch it looked like they might have had a case for a foul against Bergkamp. But I'm told that Dennis was ok, it was Freddie lying in front of Wright in an offside position as Vieira took the shot which David Moyes had a moan about later.

Towards the end Everton brought on Duncan Ferguson for his first game of the season, making a three-pronged attack with Rooney and SouperKev, and it was more than a bit scary. But time and time again Sol made up ground to make covering challenges.

Arsenal lined up with Gio back at left back, Freddie and Bob on the wings, and Dennis and Thierry up front.

Pires had an off-day again and was replaced by Parlour with 20 minutes to go, but Freddie did at least look a bit fitter and more effective. Bergkamp showed some good touches before running out of puff and being replaced by Kolo Toure with 5 minutes to go (credit to Everton for restricting Arsenal to defensive changes).

But the 2 stars of the day were Vieira and Campbell. Both were injury doubts both today and against Valencia, and both ended up playing like 2 men in both games. Quite amazing.

Parlour as well gave us some much needed energy at a time when Everton looked like they might grab at least an equaliser (they deserved more out of this game than they did out of the one they won against us at their place earlier in the season). Please please please can we see more of him. When things are going well, when they're winning easily, Arsenal can get away with doing things only with style. But when they're up against it, Ray Parlour's your man. If not starting with him, can we at least be a bit quicker to bring him off the bench in future...?

Arsenal go 2 points clear again. See league table and run-in calculator. The St Totteringham's Day spreadsheet is there too. Thanks to everyone who's written to remind us that if they fail to beat Bolton on Monday evening, Tottenham will be unable to catch Arsenal this season. It's not much of an ambition these days of course, but it would be the day that one can cash in on those pre-season "who'll finish higher" bets with absurdly optimistic Spurs fans. Surely they can't fail to beat Bolton? But as someone who'd quite liek to see West Ham stay up, I have to admit to mixed feelings about this one. A draw would be nice, I guess.