3 positive and 2 negatives from a big Arsenal win at Preston

Hey Presto(n)! Arsenal have eased into the Carabao Cup quarter-finals after a resounding 3-0 win at Deepdale on Wednesday night.

The Gunners could not have wished for a better outing as they had effectively ended the tie by half-time, with a much-needed Gabriel Jesus goal and an Ethan Nwaneri wonder strike putting us in the driving seat for a knockout triumph.

Kai Havertz then completed the rout on 57 minutes with a brilliant header to finish off the hosts and, in truth, it was all that we deserved as Preston had never really threatened to stall our march to the quarter-finals, where Crystal Palace await.

3 positives and 2 negatives from the 3-0 Carabao Cup win against Preston  

So, the hunt for silverware lives on, and here are some positives and negatives to take from our good night in the north west.

Positive #1: A Star is Born

Lady Gaga, eat your heart out!

Okay, Ethan Nwaneri did not exactly announce himself here as he also grabbed the headlines via two goals against Bolton in the last round. However, he arguably surpassed that with a top-class display in the middle on Wednesday night.

From a few wonderful touches on the half turn to some excellent movement in and around the box, almost everything he touched turned to gold, capped off by a truly breathtaking strike to double our first-half advantage.

He nearly matched it later on with another fine shot that clipped the top of the crossbar, but it did not really need to go in for onlookers to know they were watching a prodigious young talent in action.

Though he is just 17, Nwaneri looks like he belongs at first-team level and is ready for a big role this campaign, and Arsenal will need all the help they can get if they are to go deep in four competitions in 2024/25.

Should he start against Newcastle?

Negative #1: Use of Injury-prone players

It is hard to pick out negatives from such a dominant performance, but one place to start might be the strange reliance on injury-prone figures.

Among those men was Jurrien Timber, who started at RB despite hobbling off versus Liverpool last weekend and having already missed several games through injury. Likewise, Bukayo Saka came on after the hour mark even though the game had been wrapped up and, again, despite his own issues over the past month.

Mikel Arteta is obviously best placed to know what his players need and maybe minutes are just as important for building momentum/getting up to speed. However, the fixtures will come thick and fast over the next few months, so turning to big names for a match that never looked in doubt may raise some questions.

But we got the desired result and everyone came through the game unscathed; perhaps we can leave it at that.  

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