Last season, Arsenal were playing free flowing, attacking football. Up until April that was enough to have us at the summit of the Premier League. After we lost William Saliba to injury and some other factors, we ended up losing the title to the juggernaut that is Manchester City – who had a phenomenal season winning the treble.

This season, the approach has clearly changed. Mikel Arteta has spoken many times about control and his ruthless nature in obtaining this has seen us have a more considered approach to games – with more control. It’s also led to the Arsenal manager dropping fan’s favourite Aaron Ramsdale – who to be fair to him has been outstanding for Arsenal and hasn’t done much wrong to lose his place.

What David Raya brings is more control, and is far more comfortable on the ball. In his first game for Arsenal, his distribution and control on the ball helped us win at a ground we hadn’t won at in 6 seasons. And despite having issues yesterday, we beat Manchester City for the first time in 12 attempts.

Based on Everton and Manchester City alone, we’re already doing better than last season.

Last season we were devastating in attack, with Saka, Martinelli, Jesus and Nketiah all in goalscoring form. This season we might not making as many chances but more importantly, we’re not conceding needless goals.

Being an attacking team last season, we were prone to conceding goals on the break. When we lost the ball in transition, we struggled. Unfortunately for Aaron Ramsdale, it happened twice this season and that’s when Mikel Arteta thought enough is enough.

Against Fulham when Saka cheaply lost the ball, the team were caught out for the opening goal. Then against Manchester United, Havertz lost the ball and they scored with Rashford on the break. It’s no co-incidence that after that game (even though we won), Ramsdale was dropped.

Raya has come in and we’ve beaten Everton, beaten PSV, drawn against Tottenham, beaten Bournemouth and beaten Manchester City. If you looked at that set of fixtures before we played them I don’t think many Arsenal fans would have thought we’d win all of those.

Of course, we lost to Lens (ironically, due to a Raya mistake) but Mikel Arteta doubled-down on this when asked after the Manchester City game, basically saying he is telling Raya to play like that and if anyone has a problem take it up with him.

Pep Guardiola is a man who is obsessed with control and you can see it in the way he gets his teams to play, which players he signs and his whole approach – so it’s hardly a surprise when Mikel Arteta has a similar outlook.

Will this new approach be enough? There’s still a hell of a long way to go this season but based on the games we’ve played already (the Everton and Manchester City games in particular) then Arteta is giving us the best possible chance.

David Raya was signed on loan from Brentford in the summer transfer window (with an eye to make it permanent next summer) and since then, there have been many debates on the goalkeeping situation at Arsenal.

Mikel Arteta has said that he wants two top quality goalkeepers, in keeping with trying to create a squad that have two strong options in every position on the pitch. And he’s also said that he’ll deal with having two top goalkeepers by rotating them. But it’s clear even now, at this early stage, that David Raya is now Arsenal’s Number 1.

The fact is, even from my untrained eye, David Raya has clearly added another dimension to this Arsenal side. Aaron Ramsdale is good with his feet, but David Raya is just far better – he is so reassured and the passing between him, the defence and even the midfield is obvious – his short and long passing is generally spot on, and he’s so calm with the ball at his feet.

With Ramsdale, there’s always a feeling he might give the ball away or make a mistake with the ball at his feet.

And the statistics back this up. This excellent video from Tifo Football IRL explains exactly why and how David Raya is a significant upgrade on Aaron Ramsdale.

One problem for Arsenal fans, and myself included when Raya first signed, is that Aaron Ramsdale is an excellent goalkeeper. I don’t think anyone can argue about that.

I don’t think many people would argue that he shouldn’t be England’s Number 1 as well, ahead of Jordan Pickford.

Ramsdale make some truly outstanding saves last season (and also the season before). There have been countless times where he’s made some really unbelievable saves which have caught the eye of fans and experts alike.

But the biggest problem I think with all this is that we’ve seen the evolution and growth of one of the most likeable players at the club in Aaron Ramsdale. He is known for his, let’s say, “spiky” nature on the pitch. And we Arsenal fans love it. But most importantly, he has come into the club at a young age (he’s still young now obviously) but we’ve seen him develop into one of the best goalkeepers in the Premier League.

We’ve seen him develop, mature and help this young Arsenal side almost win the Premier League. His improvement has been amazing and the problem for most Arsenal fans is that he will keep improving, given the trajectory he’s on.

But the bottom line is Mikel Arteta has seen an upgrade in David Raya who, he feels, can take Arsenal to the next level now. We’ve seen the Arsenal be ruthless in the past, including when he brought Aaron Ramsdale to the club and Bernd Leno ended up leaving. And we all know about what happened to Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

But how do you think this situation is going to affect Arsenal this season? And who do you think will end up being Arsenal’s Number 1 goalkeeper? Can Aaron Ramsdale work his way back into the team?