THERE are times when you wonder what did we ever do to Newcastle United – this strange team of limitless pride and sporting underachievement, the Spurs of the North if you will.

The comparisons with Tottenham are quite acute: both wildly overcelebrated second-rate trophies last season, both claim loud histories nobody can remember, both seem to hate Arsenal more than cold chips.

We saw it again at St James’ Park on Sunday in a match in which the Magpies seemed like they were playing their sworn enemies.

We’ve become their Moriarties. Their Mumm-ras. Their Regina George, Nurse Ratched and smiling Stay Puft all rolled into one. It must be horrifying for them.

There they were stuffing hands into Arsenal players’ faces and sliding in with thumping tackles like classless Sunday league brawlers.

So, what lies behind such fire and fury?

There can only really be one explanation on the Tyne. The penny has dropped: Newcastle fans and players have realised Arsenal are elite.

Yes – after all those years of Sokratis and Mustafi, and Giroud missing sitters, the Gunners can now claim to have the best squad in the Premier League.

It’s cost a few bob, granted – but the puzzle is unlocked: Newcastle hate Arsenal because they want to be them. Only plain old green-eyed jealousy, a tale as old as time, must be fuelling this one-way, crazed animosity.

The Arsenal team will have headed home to London with no reason to think about Newcastle again until the return match.

But it’s obvious the seething team in black and white must have a backroom shrine to the Gunners, a corkboard full of brainstormed plots of how to beat Mikel Arteta’s team. Most of them just say: get Joelinton and Bruno Guimaraes to sharpen their studs – but they’ll be researching others.

This will be the problem for Arsenal in the weeks and months ahead.

The more people clock that this version of Arsenal is the best since the invincibles, the more there will be a target sign on their backs.