Going through Tottenham, Bayern Munich and Chelsea inside every week – a run any aspect would discover an excessive take a look at – and incomes two wins and a battling draw can’t be thought-about something apart from a constructive return however Arsenal could also be left feeling they might have carried out even higher.

After excellent performances in beating rivals Spurs earlier than dispatching Bayern on the Emirates, Sunday’s match with Chelsea was at all times going to be tough with restoration time restricted.

And preparations had been additional hit with key centre-back William Saliba dominated out with a knock picked up in coaching – the France worldwide set for extra assessments.

Provided that context, a 1-1 draw secured by means of Mikel Merino’s header to go away the Gunners 5 factors clear on the prime of the desk is much from a poor consequence. However having seen his aspect play towards 10 males for almost all of the match following Moises Caicedo’s pink card, supervisor Mikel Arteta additionally admitted a chance to increase the lead additional had been missed.

“It has been a giant week, beginning with the derby,” he mentioned. ” Then to play Bayern Munich three days later [and] we misplaced gamers in these video games.

“Immediately, for instance, we needed to play a partnership [in defence] that we by no means performed earlier than in a extremely tough match.

“The captain continues to be not right here (Martin Odegaard), the 9 continues to be not right here (Viktor Gyokeres), Kai (Havertz) continues to be not right here, We misplaced Leo (Trossard) in midweek as nicely, However the workforce needed to react to that.”

Odegaard and Gyokeres did come off the bench for the Gunners within the second half at Chelsea.

“I believe total it has been a extremely constructive week as a result of the problem was immense,” added Arteta.

“However I’ve this flavour that as we speak we should always have and we may have received the sport and we have not. That is a studying level from it.”