Arsenal kicked off their pre season yesterday with a 1-0 win over Milan and sure as eggs is eggs, it was Bukayo Saka who was the difference maker.

Annoyingly I wasn’t able to watch the game in full because I was at work, but even if I’d have been off, there’s zero chance I’m paying a tenner to watch friendlies. I mean, I get the club being creative with new revenue streams, but I pay over a grand a year for my season ticket, so surely giving some kind of mega discount to those already shelling out a fair bit of coin would be a better idea?

Obviously not and so I shan’t be watching any of the matches in real time. If I can find a stream that gives me more extended highlights within 24-48 hours I will do, but with the next game coming up this weekend, like yesterday’s news becoming chip paper, Arsenal results in pre season have a very short shelf life.

Arteta named a strong blended line up to kick our pre season off though, with Raya, White, Saliba, Calafiori, Norgaard, Rice, Saka, Havertz and Martinelli all starting. Milan started with their new number one (with Maignan off somewhere this summer) and by all accounts they too had a pretty strong XI, playing Leao, Pulisic, Musah, Tomori, Pavlovic and Loftus-Cheek all playing, but Arsenal pretty much dominated from start to finish. That’s not surprising really; this is a Milan side that finished eighth last season and has got a goalie on the way out, lost Reijnders to City earlier in the summer and probably is unlikely to be competing for the title this season. They are a big name but their current squad suggests it is the name above the personnel that is the big draw.

From the highlights I’ve seen it looks like we got a very good performance from Nwaneri – clearly there to impress having cut his holiday short following the under-21s – and he dominated a lot of the highlights I saw from us in that first half. I’ve read one or two of the perspectives on the online site and a few other places and it sounds as though Norgaard was tidy too. That’s what we’re expecting from him this season; we want a guy who will deputise well when he comes in and if we’re thinking that Milan are a kind of upper-middle table side in Serie A, then that’s the sort of side that you’d expect Norgaard to do well against if we’re dominating possession and chances at home, for instance.

And we did in both halves, but that first half we forced their goalie into three good saves and had 11 shots in total to Milan’s two. Raya had little to do in that first half and even after he swapped in the second, Kepa was only forced into one save that was pretty much down his throat.

Our goal from our Starboy was one that was very impressive in terms of the delivery and for all of the talk of a Kiwior potential exit this summer, if there are Italian clubs sniffing around him for a possible return, they’ll have noted his end product play with that superbly whipped ball into the box for Saka to ghost in and hit the back of the net. It wasn’t the tidiest finish from Saka, but he timed his run perfectly and you can’t ask for much more than that. It was by far and away what we had deserved based on the stats up until that point and from what I’ve watched on the highlights we’d pretty much replicated that first half form in the second too. Shots from Trossard and Nelson stand out to me and what I thought was interesting was seeing an Arsenal side willing to have a pop from outside of the box. Not only that, but hitting the target too and I thought Nelson was particularly unlucky to have his shot low to the left hand corner saved by their ‘keeper. SofaScore has Terraccino as one of their best players on the night and that tells you a story of our dominance. Perhaps some naysayers will argue that Arsenal showed a familiar failing in not being able to convert their chances and finish off Milan, but it’s pre season and the players are only just getting started now, so I’m not too worried about it.

That’s because minutes got into the legs, players who have been out for a while got back into the swing of it and ultimately Arsenal kicked off pre season with a win, which is a ‘nice to have’ for sure. The weird penalty shoot-out thing I’ll never quite understand but I guess it’s a bit of fun for the fans.

I’ve seen a video doing the rounds focused on Zubimendi and I’ll be honest, I liked what I saw. There was plenty of verticality in his passing on the montage I watched and hopefully as pre season goes on we’ll start to see more and more what he’s going to bring to this side. We have three games in Asia and then two back home against Villareal and Athletic Club in the Emirates Cup and by the time we’re back in England you’d expect the team to be forming those connections and be a little more like the Arsenal we’re going to see at the big kick off on 17th August. But for now, it’s job done, which sounded like it was Arteta’s thoughts after the game. There’s nothing really worth pointing out from his press conference from my perspective, other than the fact he rightly batted away Gyokeres talk and praised Dowman and Salmon for making their debuts for the club. A great day for them and their families and I’m sure they were delighted to get on the pitch – Dowman even had a decent effort in the second half, so good on him.

And that’s me done for the day. Time to clock off and get on with some work. Enjoy your Thursday – whatever it is you are doing – and I’ll be back tomorrow. I wonder if they’ll announce Mosquera today for us to finally talk about him as an Arsenal player tomorrow, eh?

See you then.