The smile on Declan Rice’s face with six minutes of normal time remaining said it all. He had just shut down Ian Maatsen as the Aston Villa full-back zoomed into the box. Arsenal, for whom Bukayo Saka scored the only goal, were authoritative and seemingly took great satisfaction in keeping Villa at arm’s length.

Unai Emery’s work‑in‑progress side struggled to test the champions, David Raya untroubled. The records will show Villa have lost their first two league matches of a season without scoring for the first time since 2002 but, despite successive defeats, this time there was no capitulation.

• Martínez and Jackson latest duo to move between clubs

• Goretzka and Suzuki could make debuts against Arsenal

Unai Emery has said Aston Villa and Chelsea are enemies rather than friends, insisting the clubs want to “kill” each other despite regularly doing business in recent years.

Emiliano Martínez became the latest player to move between the teams, after Chelsea paid £117m to sign Morgan Rogers from Villa this summer. Nicolas Jackson, who could become Villa’s record signing after joining in a deal worth up to £65m, and Alejandro Garnacho both joined Villa from Chelsea in this window, the latter on a loan deal with a conditional obligation to buy.