Viktor Gyokeres: Mikel Arteta admits Arsenal did not play to striker's strengths in win over Manchester United | OneFootball

Swedish international made his Premier League debut at Old Trafford

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Mikel Arteta admitted Arsenal did not get the best out of Viktor Gyokeres on his competitive debut for the club.

Gyokeres did not have a single shot in his hour on the pitch. His impact was largely limited to a physical battle with Matthijs de Ligt, which the Arsenal man largely had the better of.

The striker did not make the most of the few chances he did have to run in behind, but Arteta was left frustrated that the Gunners did not find their new team-mate more often.

“I think there are seven, eight situations when the ball is completely open to play through and we are in and attacking the ‘keeper,” Arteta said.

“We give the ball away and then it becomes a basketball game.”

Asked specifically about Gyokeres’ performance, Arteta added: “Well he did a lot of things very good.

“You can tell especially in our high press and rhythm that we demand, that especially in the first half we were giving a bit too much time. It is something that we have to work on him, especially there.

“Then in the final action situation, he did not have that many chances to do that, because in the previous action, we had to play that last ball and the line was standing still with 40 metres to play.

The north Londoners offered very little in the final third and were particularly shaky in defence in the first 45 minutes.

United regularly broke dangerously, with Patrick Dorgu and Bryan Mbeumo left completely free out wide, but Arsenal showed the necessarily resilience to hold on for an opening three points.

“We showed in a different way today,” Arteta said.

“I think we did two things very well - one to take the set-piece and then to react to mistakes. Some of them unnecessary, some of them unusual. But the way every single player reacted to that gave us the opportunity to win the game. If not it’s impossible.

“That is about how we compete and how much we want it.”

On what Arsenal can take from winning despite being below their best, the Spaniard added: “That gives you certainly momentum and confidence, two very important things.

“Because you know that when you are not at your standards - in certain aspects which today we were not being fair - we can still come away and find a way to win the game. The team has to find that resilience throughout the season for ten months in different contexts to be able to do that.

“Of course we have to improve a lot of things and that will happen very soon, but in terms of managing to get that into a very positive result, that is a great way to do it.”