O'Leary seethes at referee

By those decisions, possibly. By the end result, certainly not. Villa's endeavour was not equal to Arsenal's creativity and if Juan Pablo Angel is worth the £20million price tag put on him by chairman Doug Ellis, then Henry is beyond value. Not only did he score the goals but he worked slavishly, running back to help snuff out trouble when needed, closing down when it was required. No wonder Wenger said: "I am going to have to give him a break soon."

Wenger's famed myopia is obviously now cured. He clearly saw the foul on Kanu and said it was a definite penalty.

He would also, then, have seen the one blemish on the Arsenal performance - a second-half booking for Patrick Vieira that means the Arsenal captain will now miss the Premiership game with Manchester City on 1 February.

"We can all see that Patrick is now fit again," said Robert Pires referring to his compatriot's domination of central midfield in which Lee Hendrie and Thomas Hitzlsperger were given an object lesson in how to run the game.

Villa's only two chances came from an Angel lob that went wide and a Marcus Allback effort that flew the wrong side of the post. Apart from that, Sol Campbell and Pascal Cygan were a barrier Villa could not breach. Wenger knew the value of yesterday's win coupled with Manchester United's defeat at Wolves. But there was a streak of realism in his assessment of the implications.

"I am not saying I was crying when Manchester United lost," he said. "But it is too early in the season yet. All I know is my team are up for it and they are hungry. Every week they are are up for it. We have learned, we are more mature, we are better-equipped and we have better defensive stability."

While Wenger's eyesight has sometimes been called into question, there is nothing wrong with his memory. Returning to the Henry free-kick incident, Wenger recalled a similar experience suffered by Arsenal against Leeds at Highbury. Ian Harte was the beneficiary that day as Leeds won 2-1. The Leeds manager that day? David O'Leary. Maybe what goes around really does come around and that is no laughing matter for Aston Villa.