Sir Alex Ferguson was a firm believer in strengthening from positions of strength, his title-winning Manchester United sides forever evolving in subscription to the theory that if you are not moving forward, you are standing still while everyone else catches up.
It is Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal iteration, though, who have to do the catching, hence why £200million has been spent this summer to bridge the gap to Manchester City.
The first look at the Gunners in Premier League action this season offered a note of caution, however, about the risks of trying to change too much, too quickly.
A 2-1 win over Nottingham Forest did not reflect Arsenal’s dominance, but nor did it involve the kind of awesome display they produced virtually from the outset of last season.
Then, the additions of Oleksandr Zinchenko, Gabriel Jesus and the returning William Saliba looked the final pieces of the jigsaw. Now, though, the puzzle looks more complex, Arsenal’s squad necessarily deeper ahead of a return to the Champions League.
Here, Arteta included all three summer signings — Kai Havertz, Jurrien Timber and Declan Rice — but went tactically rogue, leaving Gabriel out of a Premier League game for the first time in 70 matches.
Thomas Partey was asked to fill the right-back slot whenever Forest threatened, but for the most part this was more like the 3-6-1 struck upon by Pep Guardiola in the second half of last term.
The Gunners have the personnel to make the system work. Going forward, however, things may take time to click, the left side of their attack especially unfamiliar, with Granit Xhaka, Zinchenko and Jesus all gone or missing, leaving Gabriel Martinelli the only survivor from that particular section of last season’s well-oiled machine.
Becoming less predictable is a priority for Arteta, his team’s planned second assault on the title lacking the first’s element of surprise. As Ferguson and Guardiola can attest, though, the higher the bar, the more tricky the search to raise it.
