The better news is who was on the plane. Jurriën Timber is in the travelling squad for the first time since May. He hasn't featured at all this season, and having him available again changes the shape of the back line more than any signing did in August.

Marli Salmon, 17, travelled too. Cristhian Mosquera didn't. He sat out Monday's session with the muscular problem picked up against Villa and will miss a second successive game, which is how these things go when a club calls something "not too serious" three times.

So Riccardo Calafiori carries more of it. Player of the Month nomination in August, and by his own account he's enjoying the timing of this one. He arrived from Bologna for £33.6m and it's taken him two seasons to look like the obvious pick.

The Guardian has the sharpest read on Martin Ødegaard's start — that the new thing isn't his passing but his running into the box, arriving as a threat rather than a supplier. Three goals in all competitions already. That's where the goals are coming from with no striker signed.

Budapest was 102 days ago. Arteta says he's relishing another go, and there isn't much else he could say.

Eight Ballon d'Or nominations for the club, Arteta among them for Coach of the Year.

On the women's side, Georgia Stanway has already altered how Arsenal move up the pitch. For eighteen months that route was Kim Little and Mariona. Lisa Baum's solo goal won it at Brighton, 1-0, and Crystal Palace come to the Emirates on Sunday.

That's worth more than it sounds. Last year the criticism was that Arsenal broke teams down by dead ball or not at all. If the answer is a winger who stretches the pitch and a midfield willing to hit him, the set-piece jibe stops working.

I still think the front line is a body light. But the shape of the argument has shifted since the window shut, and it's shifted because of how they're actually playing.

David Raya's line is that the "relief" of finally winning the league is what's behind it, and that this side can beat anybody. Fine. Confidence explains the swagger, not the passing patterns.

Napoli away on Wednesday, first game of the league phase, and the draw doesn't get gentler after it. Real Madrid, Bayern, Dortmund. Three from three in the league is a good place to arrive in Italy.

Angelinou Pedro signed his first professional contract yesterday. Always good to see, and you'd rather the pathway stayed open given Ethan Nwaneri's gone to Dortmund on loan for the season.

Nwaneri and Tommy Setford both started with wins at their new clubs. Setford's at Stevenage in League One, which is exactly the sort of loan a young keeper needs.

The women are back at home on Sunday against Crystal Palace, after Lisa Baum's tenth-minute goal won it at Brighton. One game, one win, one clean sheet for Misa Rodríguez.

The opening half-hour was the best football at the Emirates in a while. Chelsea came in having scored freely under Xabi Alonso and Arsenal simply went with them rather than shutting the game down. That's not how this side usually wins these.

Ødegaard was the game. The Athletic makes the case that this is a genuine renaissance rather than a good afternoon, and having watched him instigate everything from first whistle to last, I'd go along with it. He's got three in all competitions already. Last season he spent months looking like a player managing his own body.

Havertz's numbers keep quietly stacking up too. Goal and assist, and level with Ødegaard at the top of the scoring.

So the striker question hasn't gone away, but it's harder to shout about after that. Nine points, five goals, and the attack is producing from midfield rather than waiting for a centre-forward to be signed. That was always the argument for standing pat. It's holding up so far.

Ezri Konsa's home debut deserves a mention. £51m plus add-ons from Villa, and he spent the afternoon winning duels against a front line that had been carving people open.

Arsenal Women beat Brighton 1-0 on Saturday, and the U18s saw off Southampton by the same score.

Napoli away on Wednesday. First proper test of whether the legs hold.

That's the bit worth sitting with. Not that the club missed on Morgan Rogers or Julián Álvarez, but that a list that long produced no attacker beyond Christos Tzolis at £34m.

Arteta's defence has settled into a shape now. Wednesday's line was that this squad has to be better regardless. Yesterday it was the bigger picture, and a nod towards the old Wenger point about fans wanting new things for the sake of new things.

He's not wrong about the noise. He's answering the wrong complaint, though. Nobody's asking for a shiny name. They're asking who starts if Viktor Gyökeres pulls up.

He also made a point of thanking Gabriel Martinelli and Gabriel Jesus on the way out, which was decent and slightly overdue. Neither had a secure future here. Both gave the place plenty.

Chelsea at the Emirates today, and Ben White's talking up the atmosphere. Bruno Guimarães, Cristhian Mosquera and Declan Rice all carried something out of Villa Park, so the team sheet is the first thing to look at.

The women open their WSL season at Brighton tomorrow lunchtime at Broadfield. Renée Slegers has had eight players in and a long list out — Manuela Zinsberger, Laia Codina, Beth Mead, Katie McCabe and more besides. Élisa De Almeida arrived from Paris Saint-Germain on Thursday and has already been round the training ground.

That's a rebuilt side playing its first competitive game since May. I'd give it a month before judging anything.

The U18s beat Southampton 1-0.

He was never going to say anything else. But there’s a difference between backing the group and pretending the summer went to plan, and the framing is worth noticing — it lands as a demand on the players rather than a defence of the recruitment.

Leandro Trossard to Beşiktaş, Gabriel Jesus to Barcelona, Gabriel Martinelli to Al-Hilal for £60m. Christos Tzolis at £34m is the whole of the incoming attacking business. Four league goals so far, two of them Saka’s, one Havertz, one Ødegaard. Chelsea arrive having scored seven in two games under Xabi Alonso. Not a squad with much slack in it.

The team news is livelier than Arteta made it sound. Bruno Guimarães played the last half-hour at Villa Park on his return and picked up a knock doing it — he missed Thursday’s session and Arteta is hoping he trains on Saturday. Cristhian Mosquera came off on 79 minutes holding the back of his thigh, though Arteta called that “more precaution than anything else.” Declan Rice went off limping six minutes later and is expected to start anyway. Jurrien Timber is the genuine boost: back on the grass for a few weeks now, “in really good condition,” with a call to come after Saturday’s session. William Saliba won’t feature — a back problem with no timeline, Arteta talking about waiting to see how the bone reaction responds to load, though he’s been named in the Champions League squad. Ezri Konsa is available and may get a first start.

Morgan Rogers lines up for Chelsea. Arsenal wanted him, set a number, and wouldn’t go to the £117m Chelsea paid. He’s started well. You’ll hear about it all week if he does anything on Sunday, but I’d park the regret until he’s done it against this defence.

The women’s window is the better story. Eight signings, closed out by Élisa De Almeida on deadline day, and Slegers says it was planned long in advance. Arsenal had the oldest average squad age in the WSL two seasons running, and Manu Zinsberger, Laia Codina, Beth Mead, Katie McCabe, Rosa Kafaji, Victoria Pelova and Jenna Nighswonger have all gone. That is a rebuild, not a tidy-up.

Slegers isn’t hedging on the target either: “We’re going after the WSL.” Brighton first, on Sunday.

The Women’s Champions League draw was made yesterday — six league phase games, three home and three away.

Monday’s post had it at €70m and a four-year deal. Worth saying that the figure agreed and reported that day was £55.7m; the €70m/£60m number firmed up as the deal completed.

Seven years, arriving from Ituano, leaving as a Premier League champion with 278 appearances and 62 goals. You can argue about the last two seasons and whether he was ever going to be the wide forward this side needed — one league goal in thirty appearances last year is a hard number to defend. You can’t argue with the profit.

What you can argue with is the shape of the squad he leaves behind. Martinelli out, Jesus out, and a summer whose attacking business begins and ends with Christos Tzolis at £34m. Neither departure was scoring much lately, but that’s two forwards gone and none in.

And the Álvarez business apparently isn’t finished — plenty left in it, with Barcelona still circling and no shortage of bad blood at Atlético. That’s a January story now, and January forwards cost more than September ones. I’d rather not find out.

Arsenal Women have signed Élisa De Almeida from PSG, a three-year deal for just over half a million pounds. She takes the number 5. The 28-year-old made 154 appearances across five years in Paris and has 52 France caps, and the pressing reason for the signing is Katie Reid, who isn’t expected back from an ACL injury until around November. She can cover right-back too, though with Fox, Holmberg and Batlle there, centre-half is where she’ll play, alongside Williamson, Wubben-Moy and Catley. At that fee it’s hard to see a downside.

Chelsea at the Emirates on Sunday, the first London derby of the season. Konsa already has his Arsenal debut, having come on late at Villa Park to a mixed reception from the ground he left ten days earlier; what Sunday could bring is a first start for him and Bruno Guimarães both. The midfield is the best part of this squad by a distance. It’ll need to be.

Three targets, no addition. Tuesday’s post had Atlético giving Álvarez until Sunday, and the answer was no. Whether Arsenal were ever genuinely close on any of the three — or whether Andrea Berta’s approach of lining several deals up per position simply ran out of names — is the question nobody at the top has answered properly. It was a summer to recruit from strength, as champions, with the market tilted their way for once. Those don’t come round often.

I’d push back a little on the gloom. Bruno Guimarães at £75m and Ezri Konsa at £51m plus add-ons is not a quiet window, and Martinelli’s £60m to Al-Hilal — confirmed today, a club record — plus Jesus, Trossard and Vieira going has cleared a lot of wage bill. The squad is leaner and better balanced than it was in June.

But it’s thinner in front, and the two wins so far haven’t required much of it. Three at home to Coventry, then a 1-0 at Villa Park where the game turned on Eze coming off the bench. Six points is six points. A January when somebody’s hamstring goes will feel different.

Richard Garlick’s Men in Blazers interview landed, conveniently, just as it became clear nothing else was coming. Worth reading if you want the club’s framing.

Arsenal Women open the WSL at Brighton on Sunday. Mariona Caldentey has said Arsenal was the only club she’d have left Barcelona for, and that the deeper midfield role took adapting to. She’s been the best player in that team for two years.

James Scanlon and Habeeb Ogunneye both started for the under-21s against Brighton, days after arriving from Manchester United. Two United academy players in an Arsenal U21 side reads oddly, but neither is a kid in the usual sense — Scanlon spent last spring at Swindon, Ogunneye had fifteen games at Newport. Early signs are good.

Chelsea at home next.

It wasn’t good. The first half ended without a shot on target at either end, and Arsenal finished the game with seven shots and two on target. But Villa didn’t manage a single effort on target across ninety minutes — Emiliano Buendía’s twelfth-minute crash against Raya’s bar was as close as they came — and away from home, at a ground reduced to about 37,000 with the North Stand shut for the season’s redevelopment, you take it.

Saka now has two league goals in two games. He joined the academy at seven, in 2008, and eighteen years on he’s still the one who settles these evenings.

The other reading of the night is that Arsenal’s best attacking sequence came after a change. Eberechi Eze replaced Christos Tzolis at the break and it was Eze who found Calafiori underlapping for the goal. That’s the argument for one more attacker before the window shuts, and I’d put it more strongly: when the game turns on a substitution, that’s the fixture list dictating squad size, not a manager indulging himself.

Which brings us to deadline day. Ethan Nwaneri has gone to Dortmund on a season-long loan, no option to buy, though Arsenal have kept a January recall. He arrives as cover for Giannis Konstantelias, who tore an ACL on the opening Bundesliga weekend. Nwaneri is 19, contracted to 2030, and managed two goals in eleven appearances at Marseille — only 322 Ligue 1 minutes. The Bundesliga beats another season on this bench.

Fábio Vieira’s move to Hamburg is done, somewhere around €9-10m depending who you read, back to the club he spent last season with on loan: 31 games, seven goals, six assists. He was never getting near this midfield.

Arsenal Women are closing on Elisa de Almeida from PSG, reportedly for about £550,000 with a year left on her contract. A 28-year-old who can play centre-back or right-back, and the first centre-half Arsenal have signed since Laia Codina in 2023, with Codina having left for West Ham this summer. Sensible before a Champions League campaign.

Arteta reached 250 Premier League games at Villa Park. Seven years in December.

Thursday’s post had Vieira in advanced talks. He turns out to have been the small print.

Martinelli is the one that stings. Seven years, 278 appearances, 62 goals, and he leaves at 25 as the most expensive player Arsenal have ever sold — past Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain’s move to Liverpool in 2017. Because he arrived from Ituano as an 18-year-old for next to nothing, essentially all of it lands as profit in the accounts, which is not the least of the reasons this got done. He never kicked on from the 15-goal season, and last year told its own story: 30 league appearances but only 11 starts, and a single Premier League goal. You still don’t usually sell that profile at that age, and the sadness around it is warranted even if the logic isn’t hard to follow.

Jesus at £8.6m is the price of a contract expiring next summer. Three league starts all season. No leverage, and everyone involved knew it.

All of which is supposed to fund Julián Álvarez, and there’s the problem. Atlético will not deal with Barcelona under any circumstances. Álvarez wants the Camp Nou. Arsenal are the club standing in the corridor waiting for him to change his mind, and they’ve said they won’t open negotiations until he does. Sunday’s deadline came and went without a decision.

So: two forwards sold, one hoped for. If Álvarez says no, that squad looks thinner tonight than it did on Friday. Marcus Rashford on loan is doing the rounds as the fallback — separate from the Álvarez pursuit, apparently — but I’d want something firmer than paper talk.

Arteta, meanwhile, has asked the Premier League to expand matchday squads beyond the current 20, on player-welfare grounds. The figure he has actually pushed for is 23, in line with the Champions League; La Liga allows 23 and Serie A 25, which is his point about English clubs operating with less room than everyone else. “It doesn’t help the valuation of the player. It doesn’t help the player feel part of something.” A reasonable argument, made by a manager who is about to have fewer people to leave out.

Villa Park tonight, 8pm. Bruno Guimarães and Ezri Konsa could both make their Arsenal league debuts.

The path to that number tells the story. Hamburg had a €22m option to buy at the end of the loan and didn’t take it. Arsenal dropped their asking price to €18m. Now they’ll settle for roughly half that, with a sell-on clause as consolation, because there’s a year left on his contract and nothing to be gained by carrying him.

He cost €35m from Porto in 2022 — close to £30m at the time. That’s the number that stings, and it’s the number that explains why the club will take this and move on. Four years, two loans, and never a settled run in the side. It isn’t bad business now. It was bad business in 2022.

Four academy arrivals have been confirmed this week — Igor Tyjon from Blackburn, Habeeb Ogunneye, Axel Donczew from Cardiff and James Scanlon from Manchester United. Scanlon is the eye-catching one: a 19-year-old winger, born in Leicester, who came through Derby before joining United in 2021 and already has 24 Gibraltar caps and five goals, qualifying through his mother. He arrives on a free with United keeping a sell-on, and he goes straight into the Under-21s rather than the youth setup — David Horseman, who coached him at United, recommended him. There’s no plan for another loan after his half-season at Swindon.

Donczew is the one who might help lower down, and the under-18s need it. Josh Smith’s interim side lost 2-1 at Brighton on Saturday and finished with nine men: Emerson Nwaneri went for a second yellow just before half-time, and goalkeeper Jack Talbot was dismissed late on for protesting Brighton’s winner. Arsenal actually led with ten men through Abraham Owusu-Gyasi before Rudin equalised three minutes later and Oppong won it with six left. Four games, no wins.

Villa Park tomorrow night, 8pm. One played, one won, 3-0 against Coventry, and Noni Madueke sounding like a man enjoying himself after the Shield and the opener. Fair enough on the evidence.

Nothing new on Álvarez worth putting in front of you. Atlético’s Sunday deadline is today. Either it breaks in the next few hours or it doesn’t.