Arsenal Vs Burnley: 5 things we learned – End on a high

Arsenal closed out their Premier League season with a 3-1 win over Burnley on Sunday afternoon. Here are five things we learned.

It is a shame that it never really meant anything, especially with Manchester United losing to Cardiff City, but Arsenal ended their 2018/19 Premier League campaign, their first without a Frenchman in charge since 1996, on a high, beating a hardened and gnarly Burnley side 3-1 on Sunday afternoon. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored twice, taking him to the Golden Boot, alongside Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane, while Eddie Nketiah also notched his first-ever Premier League strike.

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Here are five things we learned from the 3-1 win.

5. Guendouzi reiterates his talent

Matteo Guendouzi had hit what some may describe as a rookie wall. The exuberance of his youthful play had slipped into carelessness; his confidence was complacency; his mistakes were evermore frequent. Some had started to conflate this dip in performance with an initial overestimation of his talent. But on Sunday, Guendouzi quickly pushed back on that idea.

He was far from perfect, especially early on, his inexperience and hair-raising defending causing the Arsenal defensive shape to fall apart at times. But as the match progressed and he started to find his feet in the midfield, his on-the-ball skill came to the fore.

The passing was excellent, consistently breaking the Burnley lines with forward, progressive passes. Completing 89% of his passes, with just under a quarter coming in the final third, Guendouzi was the deep-lying distributor that Arsenal have lacked recently. He also regularly showed to receive the ball, even when under pressure, and looked far more capable than his midfield partner, Mohamed Elneny, who is severely limited in possession. There are still things to work on, for sure, but there is a whole lot of talent to work with.