Mikel Arteta was delighted with his team’s performance in scorching conditions at Emirates Stadium on Sunday.
Despite the heat, we started on the front foot to go into a 2-0 lead in the first half-hour, thanks to headers from William Saliba and Gabriel.
“It was a tough test with some challenging conditions, especially because of the heat, but I thought the team started brilliantly,” Mikel reflected. “In the first 30-35 minutes, we were incredible.
“We should have scored many more goals, we left the game a bit open with the score being 2-0 but, in the end, I’m really pleased collectively and individually and I think we looked really good.”
Both headers were scored courtesy of Declan Rice corners, something that will undoubtedly have pleased set piece coach Nicolas Jover.
“Yes, for sure,” Mikel agreed. “It’s something that we obviously practise, we generated a lot of set-pieces today and it’s another way of scoring. We should have scored many goals in open play as well, but today we lacked the sparkle or quality in the final touch and final pass.”
Gooners were treated to a debut from summer signing Riccardo Calafiori, who entered the fray during the second half.
“We are managing them, it’s a lot of new things for him,” Mikel explained. “It’s a big step up, but he’s so willing as you could see, for the 20 minutes that he played, he’s so energetic, so passionate, a really intelligent player. He’s going to give us a lot.”
Asked about how pre-season has gone overall, from California and Pennsylvania to north London, the boss was in high spirits.
“We had four or five different groups, so it’s been quite challenging, in terms of the schedule for everybody and playing everybody,” he said. “But the staff have put some unbelievable work [in], I think the club has as well in the way that they have organised all the games and the tour.
“Thank you everybody for the contribution and I think overall it’s a really positive pre-season for us.”
With less than a week to go until the Premier League begins, attention now turns to one final week of hard work at Sobha Realty Training Centre.
“Absolutely, we’ve done all this work now to be in the best possible position to start the season in a really strong way, and we start here,” Mikel said.
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