Arteta plays down Brentford defeat

The Arsenal manager, Mikel Arteta is not overly worried by his side’s loss to Brentford in a tune up game on Wednesday.
Arteta says the friendly was only aimed at seeing his side improve their match fitness ahead of the restart of the 2019/20 season on June 17.
Arsenal will return to Premier League action when they face Manchester City at the Etihad next Wednesday and Arteta has been putting his side through its paces in preparation for the big clash.

Joe Willock and Alexandre Lacazette scored for the Gunners in the Brentford friendly but the North London club eventually lost by the odd goal in five to the Championship club.

“We’re trying different things,” Arteta told Sky Sports, when asked about the defeat. 
“We’re trying to give minutes in their legs to all of the players, obviously you have to change a lot of players through the games.
“Getting adapted to playing in an empty stadium as well, not having that energy from the fans. It was good, we played two friendlies, we’re getting a bit of rhythm, we haven’t played for a while, we tried to make it as close as possible to a real game.”
The Premier League was suspended in March, and Arteta fears that teams in the English top-flight are going to struggle with the physical demands put on them.
Arteta added: “I think that’s a big question mark. We’ve been trying in big groups just for 10 days. You can play a friendly game, you can play 45 minutes, but it’s not the same as Premier League rhythm at all.
“We will have to see that. I think it will be very difficult to sustain big rhythms for 90 minutes for the first few games at least.”