A debut defeat and an outing that was underwhelming but left the sense he was underused may matter little. When it comes to competitive games, Viktor Gyokeres’s Arsenal bow will come at Old Trafford against Manchester United on 17 August. But as he donned their No 14 shirt for the first time in a game, Arsenal at least showed the need for Gyokeres, the forward who scored 97 goals in 102 games for Sporting CP.
The first north London derby staged outside the United Kingdom yielded a 1-0 loss to Tottenham, with Arsenal registering a lone shot on target, which Kai Havertz directed at Guglielmo Vicario. Gyokeres was limited to the last 20 minutes, including stoppage time, as Arsenal were largely toothless. The argument that they needed a specialist goalscorer is scarcely new, but perhaps it was underlined when they spent an initial £55m to acquire one.
