Arsenal finally slayed one of English football's stubbornest ghosts on Sunday, beating Liverpool 1-0 at Anfield for their first win on that ground in 14 years — and the victory did more than end a hoodoo. It sent the Gunners clear at the top of the Premier League table heading into the new week.

Kai Havertz settled the contest in the 16th minute, slotting a close-range finish past Alisson Becker at the back post after Declan Rice squared a low cross through the Liverpool box. The move began with a Liverpool mistake: Alisson tried to play a short pass out from a goal kick, only for Arsenal captain Martin Odegaard to intercept it and spring the counterattack that Rice and Havertz finished off.

The goal was a milestone strike for Havertz, too. According to ESPN's match coverage, it made the German forward the all-time leading German goal-scorer in Premier League history, with 46 goals, one ahead of Ilkay Gundogan.

Fortress Breached

Arsenal's win was its first at Anfield since 2012 — a result that, as the Associated Press noted, dated back to when current Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta was still a player in the club's midfield. Liverpool pushed hard for an equalizer in the closing stages of the first half: Florian Wirtz rattled the crossbar with a free kick, Alexis Mac Allister headed over from close range while unmarked, and the home side had multiple penalty appeals waved away. Remarkably, Liverpool never managed a single shot on target all match. Late on, Alisson atoned somewhat with a sharp save to deny Christos Tzolis and keep the deficit at one, as Arsenal recorded its sixth clean sheet in nine league games.

"In the end, that defensive line, the way we stick together, that togetherness we have, is undefeated," said Arsenal's Declan Rice afterward.

The result was Arsenal's eighth win of the campaign, lifting the club three points clear of Manchester City and five ahead of third-place Brighton — the only club to have beaten the Gunners so far this season. Liverpool, meanwhile, sees its five-match winning run snapped and stays fifth, nine points off the pace; the champions' only other league defeat this season came against Manchester City at Anfield on October 11.

Arsenal arrived at Anfield just days after a shock League Cup exit to fourth-tier Fleetwood Town on penalties, a match in which Arteta had rotated heavily with a second-string lineup. He restored his regulars for the Liverpool trip, and it paid off in the biggest possible way. "This is the magical thing about football," Arteta said after the win.

Liverpool's Dominik Szoboszlai struck a more measured tone in defeat: "It takes time to get to the top." For now, that's exactly where his side's title rivals sit.