United trailed to Alexandre Lacazette’s strike a quarter of an hour in, but hit back through Ayoze Pérez and Matt Ritchie to claim a fourth win on the bounce.
Rafa Benítez’s side sit tenth in the table with 41 points – just one shy of Everton, who they visit next Monday night.
And Dummett – who hasn’t missed a minute of Premier League action since New Year’s Day – insists that Newcastle should head to Goodison Park in confident mood after ending their long wait for a win over Arsenal.
Asked as to whether he thought the Magpies could now consider themselves safe, he told nufc.co.uk: “Yes, definitely.
“I think, even with 38 points, it would have been hard for teams to catch us. It’s been a tough game today – we knew it was going to be tough before the game. Credit to everyone who played. We’ve managed to get the three points that have taken us to 41, which sees us comfortable now.
“With the last four results, we’ve won four games in a row now, and confidence is high. We’ll go to Everton hoping to beat them and take over them. Our main priority was to make sure we were safe this season, but the amount of points we’ve got the last four games has seen us safe, so now we can start looking up and we can try and win as many games as we can to try and finish as high as we can.”
Not since 2010 had the Magpies recorded a victory of any sort over Arsenal, but – with Benítez’s troops having already beaten Manchester United and drawn with Liverpool on Tyneside this season – the Premier League’s traditional heavyweights have found the going tough at St. James’ Park of late.
For Dummett, there were similarities between Sunday’s success and February’s memorable win over the Red Devils – though, just as they did at Leicester City’s King Power Stadium a week ago, the defender felt that the Magpies had more than enough in their locker to deal with their opponents’ late threat.
“I thought we were pretty comfortable at the end, but it is tough when you’re sitting back and they have all of the ball,” he said. “You have to be really organised, with a lot of organisation between the back four and the midfield, making sure you’re all in the right position, and we were.
“When you go a goal down in any game, it’s a tough challenge, but especially when you go a goal down against a top team in England, which has got a lot of top players worth a lot of money. We had to work hard as a team. We had to be compact and narrow and not let them play through the middle of us, because we know how much quality they’ve got. We got that one goal and after that we carried on fighting until the end of the game to make sure we got the three points.”
