3 positives & 2 negatives from Arsenal's year-opening win at Brentford

Positive #2: Life without Saka may not be so bad

In the continued absence of key man Bukayo Saka, Ethan Nwaneri made the first Premier League start of his career in place of his fellow academy graduate and boy did he do well.

The record-breaker put in a brilliant performance and offered plenty as his team were forced to come from a goal down at the Gtech. Playing 78 minutes, Nwaneri had a pass accuracy of 92% and also created two chances for his teammates.

While the brilliance of Saka will not be completely replicated, Nwaneri showed against Brentford that with consistent chances and performances, he can certainly make life without the star winger not as bad as expected for Arsenal.

Negative #2: Poor passing

Despite the win and the creative positivity that inspired it, Arsenal's passing was not all that brilliant and was quite poor, particularly in the first half.

Brentford's opener came after a poorly executed pass by skipper Martin Odegaard was cut out by Mikkel Damsgaard who set up Bryan Mbeumo to score. There were a few more occasions where the Gunners invited unneccesary pressure thanks to their passing.

In total, Brentford made seven interceptions with Arsenal maintaining a pass accuracy of 83%. The Gunners were lucky not to have been made to pay for their lax passing on Wednesday night.

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