It was the inauspicious anniversary. Tuesday marked a year to the day since Alexis Sanchez swopped Arsenal for Manchester United and when his current club, desperately trying to be ubiquitous on social media, tweeted about it, the Gunners deluged them with mocking replies.

As Sanchez makes his first return to the Emirates Stadium, with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer hinting a man displaced from the Premier League side will be granted just his second start for him, it is a move that benefited no one - except, perhaps, Manchester City who sense missing out on the Chilean amounted to a lucky escape.