Neil Humphreys: Gunners’ Emery is the new Special One

Unai Emery is turning into quite a plumber. He plugs leaks. Jose Mourinho, on the other hand, is turning into an incontinent dog in search of a tree. He leaks everywhere.

Recent events have highlighted two managers heading in opposite directions.

When they meet at Old Trafford tomorrow (Singapore time), the Manchester United manager could be forgiven for giving a wry smile when he greets the Arsenal coach.

Emery looks like a Special One. He looks like a young, vibrant manager dipped in positivity. He looks like the old Mourinho.

Their reactions to recent performances contrasted so sharply that even the most jaundiced of Red Devils must recognise the worrying differences between the two men.

At half-time, Arsenal were 2-1 down to Tottenham, thanks to a couple of dodgy Spurs goals. This was a common hard luck story under Arsene Wenger, another sorry example of the Gunners succumbing to a crisis of confidence.

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Arsenal can't stop scoring. An astonishing 32 goals in 14 games is a rate not witnessed for over a decade at the club. Neil Humphreys

But Emery wasn't having it. He didn't hide beneath his oversized sports coat. The plumber went to work instead. He ransacked the toolbox and found Aaron Ramsey to plug a hole in midfield and sent Alexandre Lacazette to partner Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang up front.

Emery doubled down with a double substitution. He treated a tense derby like a playful shoot-out in a video arcade. Arsenal were told to take aim at every target. Don't hold back. Just keep shooting.

Their goal-fest was a treat for the senses, but it was no fluke. Eleven Gunners have already scored in the English Premier League this season.

Alex Iwobi speaks warmly of Emery's insistence that outfield players develop an eye for goal. Everyone brings shooting boots to training.

And it's working. Arsenal can't stop scoring. An astonishing 32 goals in 14 games is a rate not witnessed for over a decade at the club. After Manchester City, the Gunners are the only other team turning penalty boxes into pinball machines.

This isn't a coincidence either, but the reinforcement of Emery's longstanding philosophy. He's an incorrigible attacker. In his first season at Valencia, he added 20 goals in the plus column (the Spaniards finished with 68, compared to 48 in the previous campaign).

Sevilla went from a goal a game to almost two under his stewardship. Even Paris Saint-Germain, who need little encouragement to score in a one-team league, still found room for a few more in the Emery era.

In the North London Derby, the way he cajoled his players to surge forward at every opportunity - even when they were protecting a precarious 3-2 lead - was exhilarating.

Arsenal's ceaseless attacking was the antithesis of the dreary fare served up by Mourinho's static bollards against Southampton.

Unlike Emery, he didn't plug leaks. He reportedly leaked stories to the press instead. Another alleged bust-up with Paul Pogba, which came via a reporter with close ties to Mourinho's camp, suggested another cynically-timed distraction.

Mourinho supposedly branded Pogba "a virus" and the Frenchman apparently retaliated by claiming he had no one to pass to as his manager's stifling tactics prevented teammates from running freely.

Mourinho questioned the temperament of his players, again, and lamented the absence of "mad dogs" ready to fight for his cause.

Arsenal have one "mad dog", a real Spaniard in the works who loves nothing more than snatching victory from the jaws of defeat with a couple of audacious substitutions. Just like the old Mourinho.

Emery nurtures strong characters like Lucas Torreira and improves previously flaky performers like Granit Xhaka. When they fall short of his exacting standards, they fall out of the first team. See Mesut Oezil.

The Spaniard has convinced his squad to become fully paid-up members of his methodology. Just like the old Mourinho.

The newer, jaded Mourinho doesn't have a methodology beyond antagonising his players, picking fights over real or imagined grudges and conducting media interviews with all the joy of a condemned prisoner on death row.

His players are struggling to buy into his bluster (let alone his soul-stripping defensiveness.) The proof is in the EPL table.

From last season to this, there's been a 26-point swing between Arsenal and United. The clubs, like their managers, are poles apart.

Still, the Gunners haven't triumphed at Old Trafford in the EPL since 2006. End that unwanted record and the Gunners will seriously believe in their Special One.

And Mourinho may once again be reminded of the inspirational manager he used to be.

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