The first chapter of the 2026/27 Premier League season has already been completed, but there will be no league football for the next two weekends. An international break has taken over, and the domestic calendar will remain on hold until October 10.

That pause comes after a strong start from Arsenal, whose perfect record drew talk of a potentially one-sided title race. Yet Brighton & Hove Albion halted that run before the break, a result that offered a reminder that the leaders are not beyond reach.

For now, though, attention shifts away from club football and back to national teams. This is the first time sides have come together since the 2026 World Cup, and the next couple of weeks will be filled with fixtures that should keep supporters occupied.

The Premier League’s return is set for Matchday 6, when Arsenal open the weekend at Emirates Stadium against Leeds United. It will mark the restart of a schedule that has been interrupted by an extended pause created by the international calendar.

That calendar was changed by the FIFA Council in 2023, leaving only three international breaks this season. September and October have effectively been combined into one longer window, with further breaks still due in November and March.

The stoppage is not limited to England’s top flight. Club football across Europe has also been paused until the second weekend of October, while the 2026/27 UEFA Nations League begins to take centre stage.

Teams will play four times during this window, and several matches stand out. League A includes a rematch of the Euro 2024 final between England and Spain on Sept. 26, Germany against the Netherlands on Sept. 24, France at home to Italy on Oct. 2, and Portugal facing Norway on Oct. 4.

Arsenal’s first defeat of the season brought a bleak assessment from inside the dressing room after Saturday’s 3-0 loss to Brighton & Hove Albion. Bruno Guimarães said the reaction among the players was immediate, with the standard of the performance falling well below what was expected.

“In the first throw, you could sense it, it was so clear,” Arteta lamented, whispering through his postmatch press conference with a thinly veiled sense of fury. The mood was not much brighter in the locker room around the corner.

Guimarães described the match as one to move past, but not before stressing how badly Arsenal had fallen short. “I think today is a day to forget,” he said after his first Premier League start for the club. “Everything we tried didn’t work. Credit to them [Brighton] as well but we can’t accept this here.

“I think in the changing room, everyone was complaining about ourselves, about the level we played today. Like I said, it’s not acceptable. A very bad day in the office.”

Arteta viewed the defeat as a failure to meet the demands of the game. Brighton’s pressing and direct play repeatedly forced Arsenal into errors, and the Arsenal manager said his side had not matched the basics required in the Premier League.

“Brighton were another gear up from us,” Arteta fumed. “We were extremely poor technically and not respecting the game. And from our side there were certain basics that you need to accomplish in football, especially in the Premier League, that we were very far from.”

He added: “In the first duel, the second ball, that put the game, especially how direct they were, in a really difficult place for us,” Arteta added. “On top of that, when we did regain the ball, especially in our own half, the amount of technical errors that we did and we didn’t respect any principle of play that you have to get out of those man-to-man situations.”

Guimarães was among the most disappointing performers in red, especially given the expectations behind his summer move. Recognising his part in the collapse, he then issued a message of apology to the Arsenal fanbase and promised better days ahead.

Mikel Arteta did not hide his frustration after Arsenal were overwhelmed at Brighton, admitting that his side were second best almost immediately in a defeat that exposed a clear gap in intensity.

Brighton’s 3-0 victory, delivered on the club’s 125th anniversary, was fully deserved and became Arsenal’s heaviest loss in more than three years. Although the opening goal did not arrive until the 31st minute, the contest had already tilted decisively in Brighton’s favour long before that. Their pressing from the first moments left Arsenal struggling to cope, and the visitors never recovered.

“In the first throw, you could sense it, it was so clear,” Arteta fumed, his voice barely raised above a furious whisper as he scowled through his postmatch media duties. “We put ourselves in trouble one time, two times, three times, and we need to get out of that much quicker. And that’s one of the biggest lessons that we have to take from the game.”

Arsenal were warned by Brighton’s recent form without the ball, and Arteta acknowledged that the message had been discussed beforehand. “The first thing that we had discussed, it was about the first pass,” Arteta confirmed. “If you don’t get out of that first pass as winners, it will be extremely difficult to dominate the game, and you don’t have any probability of winning the game.

“We knew that, but that’s again, credit to them for what they’ve done, because they overcame us, and they had another edge than we did, and that’s something that, at this level, it’s extremely important to respect and to understand before anything else.”

He also accepted that Brighton were stronger in the decisive duels. Arteta said Brighton “had another bite.” “There was a lot of moments when the ball is 50-50, and it changes hands, and most of the time it was for them.”

Asked whether he had considered a halftime change, Arteta admitted the thought was there but said he chose against it. “I was,” Arteta admitted after a moment of reflection, “but I would believe it wasn’t the right moment to do that with the things that we wanted to change for the second half.”