The Gunners, who finished second in the Premier League last season, spent close to £100m over the summer on the likes of Granit Xhaka, Shkodran Mustafi and Lucas Perez.
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“But the most important thing for me is that we win the game. We have conceded too many easy goals in recent games”.
Forest boss Philippe Montanier conceded the gulf in technical ability between the two sides but hopes the defeat taught his players a valuable lesson that they can take into their Championship campaign.
The imbalance was clear from the moment Xhaka struck midway through the first half and when Lucas made it 3-0 after 71 minutes it was nearly a surprise they had to wait until the third minute of stoppage time before Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain ran clear to complete the rout. But he played very deep previous year and didn’t get forward a lot.
Having scored a thunderbolt for his first Arsenal goal on Saturday, Swiss worldwide Xhaka’s stunning 30-yard strike gave hide side the lead on 23 minutes.
“Honestly, not really. I knew he had a good shot but he played very deep past year and didn’t get forward a lot”.
The 28-year-old has struggled to make an impact on the game since being released by Arsenal in 2014 with previous club Wolfsburg terminating his contract in April of this year.
Gunners boss Arsene Wenger hopes that Perez’s two goals will prove to his critics that he has what it takes to succeed after a hard start to life in the Premier League. He was sometimes impatient when he was with us. “The performance tonight shows that the players who played at Hull need to be on their toes and that’s what we want – competition for places”, said Wenger. We had some young players who did well and Lucas scored as well so overall it’s a positive night, ” continued Wenger.
Summer signings Xhaka and Perez were two of 11 changes Wenger made to his side for the Forest clash.
There will also be live text commentary from the match, with Arsenal.com providing comments from Twitter and insight from the club’s commentary team. “We played with a good team dynamic and that’s the way we wanted to play”.
“Xhaka, I’ve seen him quite a lot and he’s very good”, he told Sky Sports News.
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“It was a good experience not only for Nicklas but for all the players because Arsenal have great technique, better than us, and it was hard for us but my players, they gave everything”.
