Xabi Alonso: Chelsea players showed good 'spirit and attitude' against Arsenal

The visitors made a blistering start when 117m-pound off-season arrival Morgan Rogers opened the scoring in the second minute. The forward volleyed home after Arsenal failed to deal with Reece James' free-kick, ending the reigning champions' run of clean sheets at the start of the campaign.

Arsenal quickly increased the pressure, with Bukayo Saka denied by Emiliano Martinez before former Chelsea striker Kai Havertz levelled in the 25th minute.

Martin Odegaard then completed the turnaround five minutes after the interval, finding the net following a clever dummy from Havertz. It was his second Premier League goal in three matches.

Chelsea continued to threaten, with James forcing David Raya into a save and Pedro Neto striking the post. Substitute Estevao appeared to have rescued a point late on, but Raya produced a superb fingertip stop.

"We are disappointed. It needs to hurt, but it needs to hurt in a positive way, because it's just game three, still many games to play and we know it was going to be a very intense game today," said Alonso.

"[We] have done many right things [but] we need to make it better, we need to learn from them, because this is the top level. When we have to play top level, we want to be as efficient and as accurate in all the phases of the game.

"But this is where we are, this is game three for us of this new start, this new phase that we are starting with Chelsea. But I'm happy with the spirit and the attitude from the players. They have given everything, they have tried and they fought really hard.

"My priority is to win games [so] we want to do better, we want to be tighter, to be more clinical, more balanced. But this takes time as well. [It's] going to be a long [season] and [this game] doesn't have a big impact in our mood and in our mindset."

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