Alex Iwobi will not have been pleased with the defeat suffered by Fulham to Newcastle United over the weekend, but the midfielder took away with him the personal consolation of a new record.
Iwobi stayed on the pitch long enough — the entire duration of the game, in fact — to overtake countryman Mikel John Obi as the Nigerian with the most minutes racked up in Premier League history, a tally that currently stands at a whopping 16,291.
The 27-year-old has done so in two fewer games (247) than Mikel managed — and three years quicker, too — collecting a bouquet of priceless, pleasant memories along the way.
Here's a look at five of the more memorable.
Premier League debut
Alex Iwobi emerged as a hot prospect from Arsenal's fecund academy in his late teens, first drawing serious attention in 2013.
But it wasn't until a little more than two years later, mere days after signing his first professional contract, that he got to taste senior football for the Gunners.
Iwobi's maiden Premier League outing came in Wales, on a triumphant October 2015 trip to Swansea City's Liberty Stadium — a brief cameo that saw him introduced in stoppage time for Mesut Ozil by then manager Arsene Wenger. Plenty more was to follow.
Debut Premier League goal
London-bred Alex Iwobi would have heard what they say about that city's buses: you wait ages for one, and then two come along at once.
It was a bit like that with his first Premier League goals, with the first not arriving until March 2016, when Arsenal visited Everton. Danny Welbeck opened the scoring early, before Iwobi made sure of the result — a 2-0 win — just before recess.
Teammate Hector Bellerin lifted a ball from deep into Iwobi's path in the hosts’ half, which the latter picked up and raced with into the box, slipping a fine strike through the legs of goalkeeper Joel Robles.
His second would come just a game later — albeit after an international break — in a 4-0 home rout of Watford.
Taking the No. 17
The number Alex Iwobi wore in his early Arsenal days, 45, reflected the fact that he was rather low in the pecking order, having just come up from Hale End.
Ahead of his first full season at the club (2016/17), however, he was presented with the opportunity to rise up the roster — numerically, at least — when the No.17 shirt was handed down by forward Alexis Sanchez, who, in turn, had inherited the No.7 rendered vacant by Tomas Rosicky's exit.
“It doesn’t have any significance,” Iwobi, speaking to the Evening Standard at the time, explained his choice.
“It is just a number I like and I want to start my own thing with it.”
Suffice to say that the ‘17’ has gone on to assume special significance for Iwobi; he wore it at his next club, Everton, and probably would have done same at Fulham, where he presently plays, had first-choice goalkeeper and former Arsenal teammate Bernd Leno not been in firm possession of it.
Alex Iwobi: Most expensive Nigerian Premier League signing
Iwobi said goodbye to boyhood club Arsenal in summer of 2019, moving northwards from the English capital to Merseyside, where he joined Everton for a princely €30.4 million.
That fee remains the highest a Premier League club has ever paid for Nigerian talent. Across Europe, only the €75million spent by Napoli to bring Victor Osimhen from Lille a year later eclipses that expense, and it pretty much underlines just how esteemed Iwobi is.
It's fair to say Everton got decent returns on their investment, with Iwobi proving instrumental, especially in the last couple of seasons, as the Toffees clung to their unblemished Premier League status.
That much is reflected in the club's Players’ Player of the Year award picked up last season, just before heading back to London — this time in the west, on the books of Fulham.
First Premier League double
At Fulham, Iwobi has — statistically speaking — become more of an offensive threat than at any other point thus far in his career.
He's already just one short of the six Premier League goals he registered for Everton, in about a century of games less, and would likely reach the 11 he scored at Arsenal far sooner than the 100 matches it took to reach that mark.
Two of his first three for the Cottagers came in one game — the first time Iwobi hit a double in competitive senior club football, in fact — in the midst of a particularly productive period of Fulham's 2023/24 campaign, during which Marco Silva's team scored at least three goals in five straight league games.
Iwobi netted twice in a drubbing of visiting Nottingham Forest, late last year, connecting with crosses from Willian and Harry Wilson to grab a new milestone for himself.
And there may yet be a few more to come in the years ahead.
