Arsenal boss Jonas Eidevall explained how the Gunners were well-prepared to play against a battling Brighton backline as his side won 4-0 on the opening night of the Barclays Women's Super League.
The visitors were reduced to 10 players inside seven minutes as Emma Kullberg was sent off for chopping down Stina Blackstenius on the edge of the box.
Arsenal eventually got past Brighton's staunch defence in the 28th minute, with Eidevall revealing his side had spent much of the build-up to the game playing 11 versus 10.
"A lot of time, we play 11 against 10 because we don't have 22 players going up to this game here," he said.
"So, when I want to practice offence, I always want to practice with ten players because I find it's really hard to only practice with eight players. You don't have any central defenders, for example, and then you start doing a lot of odd positioning for it.
"I'd much rather play ten vs seven because, in the low block, we need to be so good, so we should be able to defend with seven players because that should feel like we're defending with 10.
"We do that very often in training to attack with a full-sized team, and it is not because we think we're going to play against 11v10, but we do it very often."
Captain Kim Little got the first goal of the WSL season, lashing home having been set up by sterling work from Caitlin Foord.
Arsenal's goal came after Brighton had their clearest chance of the half, young forward Elisabeth Terland shooting narrowly wide as Lee Geummin broke on the right wing.
Blackstenius, who went undetected as offside in the build-up to the red card, twice tested Megan Walsh before the half was out.
She would get her goal in the 50th minute before Euro 2022 Player of the Tournament Beth Mead grabbed a brace to take her tally to seven goals on the opening day of the season, surpassing teammate Vivianne Miedema who experienced a frustrating evening in front of goal.
Eidevall also revealed how playing against the Arsenal Under-15s boys' side had helped them as they begin their pursuit of a first WSL title in four seasons.
He added: "One thing is just practice, practice, practice to get the reactions right, but the second thing is also to practice, but it's to get the positioning right.
"For example, when we are playing against boys, our positioning needs to be better because we don't have as much time to react, so that arrives at positioning, and for me, that's key for us that our positioning always tries to be spot on."
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