It's easy to see why the Gunners fell for Timber

ARSENAL WIN 4-1 ON PENALTIES

- MIKE WALTERS

WITH his arboreal surname, Jurrien Timber will always remember his Arsenal debut as an unlikely tale of copse and robbers.

Of the Gunners' £204million trinity in the summer transfer market, the Dutch defender was their most accomplished performer in a Wembley curtain-raiser Manchester City somehow managed to lose.

Arsenal won't care two hoots that Leandro Trossard's massively deflected equaliser, 11 minutes into added time, was scarcely deserved.

And they won't shed any crocodile tears that the predators who hunted them down last season came unstuck in the shootout.

Over the next nine months of footslog, the Gunners will want to see a tangible return on the most lavish spree in the club's history.

Declan Rice, Kai Havertz and Timber have already started paying back their hefty fees.

If Arsenal got lucky in the dying seconds, lifting a trophy won't do them any harm, and it can only help repair the psychological trauma of that horrid stumble on the title run-in last April.

While £105m Rice was steady but unspectacular, and £65m Havertz will have more productive days in the box, at £34m Timber looked remarkably good value.