Arsenal have bounced back well since the 3-0 defeat at Brighton before the international break.

The Premier League champions came from behind to beat Leeds at the Emirates last weekend, then saw off Lille 3-0 in the Champions League on Tuesday night.

But Paul Merson has noticed a difference in how they’ve gone about it, and he thinks that heavy defeat on the south coast may have had a bigger effect than people realise.

Paul Merson thinks the Brighton defeat may have scared Arsenal

Merson had expected Arsenal to take the handbrake off this season after winning the title, but he feels the last two games have shown them going back to what won them the league.

“I think they’re back to a machine,” he said, speaking on Sky Sports. “I don’t know if it was the Brighton result has scared them a little bit, because I thought before that they were a little bit more open. And the last couple of games, the Leeds game and the Lille game, for me have gone back to being a bit of a machine again. That’s what won us the league.

“And I thought this year, I thought the shackles might come off and we go, you know what? We’re going to play. We got the players. We’ll open the game up, we’ll play. That ain’t the case. But yeah, I think they’re just getting back to being a machine. I still think they’re the team to beat.”

Have Arsenal changed approach this season?

Defensively, Arsenal have been really solid again this season, except of course the Brighton game. The Gunners are the only side in the Champions League yet to concede, and on the underlying numbers, they’ve been the best team in the Premier League by some distance this season.

Going forward, though, there’s certainly been a change. The ‘machine’ that won the league leaned heavily on set pieces, but Arsenal haven’t scored from one since March. This season, 36% of their goals have come from moves of at least 10 passes, compared to just 10% last season, and both the Leeds winner and the third goal against Lille came from exactly that kind of quick, flowing move.

Merson also said Arsenal made Lille look “less than average at best”, but they were goalless for 64 minutes and only pulled away after Mikel Arteta made a triple change. Slow starts have been a pattern for a while, with Arsenal failing to score in the first half of their last five games.