One team treated the game as a pre-season run out, the other team treated it like a proper competitive game.

Manchester United looked sharper, and were certainly more aggressive as they ran out 2-nil winners.

Whilst Arsenal used the game to put patterns they had learnt on the training ground into practise, Manchester United were much more direct.

The core of this Arsenal squad knows what Mikel Arteta wants as a Plan A. This pre-season has been about creating new patterns of play that will benefit us in the long term.

Yesterday we saw Jurrien Timber come in as an inverted right back. This will give us a different option to Oleksander Zinchenko playing in the same role on the left hand side.

We also saw Kai Havertz play as a more progressive 8 than Granit Xhaka did. The German made some good runs into the box and will be an attacking threat next season.

The easy option for Arteta would have have been to play the exact same way as last season, not try and develop our play and run out winners. But that is not what pre-season was for.

Meanwhile, Eric Ten Haag clearly valued getting the win over trying to get his side playing a fluent attacking style. They were all sit deep, long ball, and aggressive in tackles.

What probably sums up the different approach to the game both sides took was the challenges. Man U put in a few naughty ones that you do not really expect in a pre-season game.

As expected, the fallout on social media was “crisis”, although it seems much of the criticism came from Chelsea and West Ham fans. Both piling onto Arsenal tweets. Sums up their lives that they spent their Saturday evening watching us in pre-season.

With any friendly, how serious you take them as a fan depends on your agenda. If you just want to moan and criticise, you will act like a defeat is the worst thing ever.

A valid point to make is that our good season last year was set up by our very positive pre-season games. Victories against Everton, Chelsea, Sevilla, amongst others. And we took the good season into the start of the Premier League.

But you could make a case that we started last season too good, and that is why we ran out of steam at the business end.

Any distance athlete will tell you that they aim for negative splits. Go out at 80% to ensure you have plenty left towards the end of the race.

We were playing at 100% from day one set season. Manchester City were at 80% up until Christmas. They were able to keep a little back whilst keeping on Arsenal’s coattails.

As the season progressed, they cranked up to 100%, whilst Arsenal tailed off to 80%. They won the league, we finished 2nd.

Maybe Mikel Arteta has learned from that and, looking at the fixtures list, will be looking to start the season in and around 80%, building to 100% effort as the season progresses.

The final analysis by Adrian Clarke was spot on. Manchester United players and management treated this like a proper game.

At the end of the day, the most important thing is who wins when the two teams face each other in September.

Keenos

Yes i have been sitting on the Rice tshirt designs for about 2 weeks !https://t.co/vlaHeBWIC8 pic.twitter.com/5VrrR9cbpV

— 🎗 ///SHE WORE/// 🎗 (@SheWore) July 15, 2023