For 80 minutes it seemed fears of being blunt in attack would be founded in a frustrating stalemate at struggling Leicester but then Ethan Nwaneri dinked a feathery cross into the box and the substitute Mikel Merino, unmarked between Wout Faes and Woyo Coulibaly six yards out, twisted his head to power in the first of two late goals.
Arteta began with Leandro Trossard as a false nine, Sterling to his left and Nwaneri to his right in a three-pronged attack but until Merino’s header the Arsenal manager must have been wondering how else to penetrate Leicester, now without a clean sheet in 21 matches in all competitions.
This was the first Premier League game in which Arsenal began without any of Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli, Gabriel Jesus or Havertz, who is out for the season with a hamstring injury, for the first time in almost four years.
Just after the hour the teenager’s shot skimmed the brow of the Leicester crossbar and with time ticking in the second half he cracked a shot against a post, via the fingertips of the Leicester goalkeeper Mads Hermansen.
Merino, who replaced the ineffective Raheem Sterling, sealed victory with three minutes of normal time to play, to maintain Arsenal’s challenge.
