Arsenal moved back to the top of the Premier League with a dominant 3-0 win at Brentford, while Everton beat West Ham 1-0 to get their first victory of the season on Sunday.
Injuries to captain Martin Odegaard and Oleksandr Zinchenko had stretched Arsenal’s squad to the extent that 15-year-old Ethan Nwaneri came off the bench late to become the youngest player in Premier League history.
However, the Gunners showed no sign of weakness at a ground where they were beaten 2-0 last season to move back one point above Manchester City and Tottenham at the top of the table.
William Saliba and Gabriel Jesus headed in before half-time and Fabio Vieira marked his first Premier League start with a stunning strike after the break.
Brentford boss Thomas Frank said he believes Arsenal will be title contenders and they played like it to blow away the Bees in the first 45 minutes.
“We have a different mentality this season,” said Arsenal midfielder Granit Xhaka. “We are training like we play and have class with the players that can make a difference.”
The match had been moved forward two hours to help ease police pressures around Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral and Britain’s longest serving monarch was remembered in a minute’s silence before kick-off.
Once the action did get underway, it was one way traffic as Arsenal bounced back in style from their sole defeat of the season away to Manchester United two weeks ago.
It took just 17 minutes for Mikel Arteta’s men to make the breakthrough when Saliba flicked Bukayo Saka’s corner in off the far post.
Jesus also used his head to score his fourth goal in seven Premier League games since joining from Manchester City as he powered home an enticing delivery from Xhaka.
The absence of Odegaard also made room for Vieira and the Portuguese midfielder made his mark with a sumptuous strike from outside the box to kill off any doubt over the outcome four minutes into the second half.
‘Gut feeling’ on Nwaneri
An easy day for Arsenal was rounded off a minute from time when Arteta was able to hand Nwaneri his debut as just 15 years and 181 days, breaking Harvey Elliott’s record as the youngest player in Premier League history when he appeared for Fulham as a 16-year-old.
“It was a pure gut feeling,” said Arteta on handing Nwaneri a debut.
“Yesterday he had to come because we have injuries, especially the injury of Martin and then I had that feeling from yesterday that if the opportunity could come that I was going to do it.”
At the other end of the table, West Ham will spend the upcoming international break in the bottom three after Neal Maupay’s first Everton goal gave the Toffees a much-needed win.
Frank Lampard’s men are now unbeaten in five league games but had just four points on the board before kick-off from four consecutive draws.
An injury to Dominic Calvert-Lewin forced Everton to seek more firepower in the final weeks of the transfer window and Maupay delivered on just his second appearance since a move from Brighton.
The Frenchman spun onto Alex Iwobi’s pass and fired in from the edge of the area to lift Everton up to 13th in the table.
West Ham slip to 18th with just one win from their opening seven league games.
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