Mikel Arteta was pleased to start the season with a win as Arsenal overcame Wolves 2-0 at the Emirates thanks to goals by Kai Havertz and Bukayo Saka.
The Germany international headed home the opener from a Saka cross on 25 minutes and then repaid the favour with a quick pass to the England international who cut onto his left foot before rifling past Jose Sa with 14 minutes remaining.
Given the visitors put up a decent fight in the summer sunshine – twice forcing Raya into spectacular saves – the manager was delighted his players didn’t succumb to sloppiness in the closing stages.
“I’m really happy,” Arteta told BBC Sport. “It’s always tricky the first game to see how we’re going to respond and going back to the Premier League level and the difficulty of it. Overall, I’m really pleased with the performance and the result.”
On the challenge posed by Gary O’Neil’s side, he added: “We knew that the opposition was going to be really good today. They have a really good squad, really well coached and with a 1-0 it wasn’t enough.
“We had many chances in the first half to finish the game and open the gap. We didn’t and we had some difficulties in the second half until the second goal.”
Having selected Havertz to lead the Arsenal attack ahead of Gabriel Jesus, the manager was pleased with the former Chelsea man’s sharpness.
“I think he was involved in a lot of positive actions for the team,” reflected Arteta. “He scored a great goal, great combination, great timing, position in the box. So he’s in a good place. He was very good. And the finish on Bukayo as well, top draw.”
Solid but unspectacular would probably be a decent description of the way Arsenal played today. There were definitely moments in the game when we were on the back foot, not helped by some sloppy passing out from the back.
Given we’re only 90 minutes into the new campaign, Arteta didn’t sound overly concerned.
“I think we should have opened the gap in terms of the scoreline much earlier with the amount of situations and actions we had, especially in the first half. But then I liked that we had shown some grit and consistency, especially defending when we had to be a little bit deeper.
“We had some giveaways, especially in the first phase of the build-up that were very tricky.”
We won.
A good case to sign a potent center forward
Yeah this could have been 4-1 or 5-1 if we have had one.
Good win. But definitely a bit of rust
Sound bite from last season.
I think 2-0 up not using two remaining subs is again a missed opportunity to share the workload. It’s a long season Arteta need to use more his squad.
Till 75′ we were 1-0 up. Arteta didn’t want to disrupt what we had built up to that point. He doesn’t HAVE to use all his subs. Everyone should be fresh enough at this point to last a full 90.