Arsenal moved to the top of the Premier League table as goals from Gabriel Jesus and Kai Havertz gave them a 2-0 win over Brighton.
The Seagulls were the last away side to leave the Emirates Stadium with three points, that victory coming at the end of the last season, and the Gunners knew that a seventh straight win on home soil would be enough to move them to the summit of the League, with Liverpool not in action until later in the day against Manchester United.
Mikel Arteta’s side made a superb start, with Martin Odegaard heavily involved and Bukayo Saka a constant threat, but they could not make their first-half dominance count heading into the break.
The Gunners had 15 shots in the opening 45 minutes – Brighton failing to manage a single one – but the Seagulls made it to half-time with the scoreboard still untroubled.
Odegaard should really have opened the scoring shortly after the break, but Jesus did just that within eight minutes of the restart. Brighton failed to deal with a corner, Jan Paul van Hecke only flicking it on to Jesus at the back post, who did the rest with a header into the back of the net.
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Lewis Dunk almost single-handedly prevented Arsenal from extending their advantage, producing a superb block to deny Odegaard and then clearing a Ben White header off the line, before Havertz nodded over from close-range.
Arsenal had had 23 efforts by the time Pascal Gross wasted a huge chance to equalise with Brighton’s second. Kaoru Mitoma squared the ball after getting in behind White, but Gross was unable to turn the ball home from a matter of yards out.
It proved a costly miss, as Havertz continued his fine form by putting the result beyond doubt with just a few minutes of normal time remaining. Eddie Nketiah played the German clean through, and his finish was good enough to beat Bart Verbruggen and at long last seal the three points.
