It was a night of conflicting emotions for Cardiff. Neil Warnock had admitted that “in an ideal world” his club would not have played. There have been a lot of painful questions since the disappearance last Monday of Emiliano Sala – Cardiff’s record signing from Nantes – and one of them has taken in the point of it all.

How can a bunch of blokes kick a ball around with any meaning when one of their own is missing presumed dead? On the other hand, Warnock knew a game was perhaps what Cardiff needed – to get them firing again; to work up some adrenaline against all of the misery.

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Warnock saw his team play well, carrying the fight to Arsenal, especially during a first half that they controlled. He described it as Cardiff’s best away performance of the season and he could be pleased, even surprised, to see his players rack up 19 shots, albeit only two were on target.

There was frustration when Bruno Ecuele Manga stretched into an ill-advised challenge to concede a 66th-minute penalty, which Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang converted to turn the game. Warnock called it “diabolical”.

Alexandre Lacazette scored Arsenal’s second as Unai Emery’s team closed up on fourth-placed Chelsea, and the substitute Nathaniel Mendez-Laing’s stoppage-time drag back and finish was nothing more than a consolation. Yet the truth was that the football was a sideshow. Sala was in the hearts and minds of everyone and Warnock spoke with feeling afterwards.

On the upside, Warnock admitted it had done him and his players the power of good to get back out there. “The first five minutes, to shout at the fourth official was fantastic,” he said, with a smile.

Yet once again Warnock did not disguise the depth of the trauma. “I can’t explain how it’s been this week but you’ve not wanted to get out of bed,” he said. “Everything was really miserable and nobody could actually do anything about it. I know we’ve lost a game of football but there are other more important things.

“What’s gone on has been unprecedented. We spoke about it before kick-off – that we ought to, for Emiliano, try to put in a performance. I know people would expect us to lay down but I thought they showed what they were made of tonight.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Cardiff players gather for a period of silence in tribute to missing striker Emiliano Sala as the Cardiff fans hold up their yellow placards and the wreaths lie in the centre circle. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian

The travelling supporters held up yellow placards when the teams emerged for the kick-off, while the captains, Mesut Özil and Sol Bamba, strode to the centre circle to lay wreaths. There was one bouquet of yellow tulips – the symbol of Nantes – and another of yellow daffodils to represent Wales. It was also a nice touch from the programme editors to include Sala’s name at the bottom of the squad lists on the back cover – hauntingly, without a shirt number.

There were banners in the away end. “Once a bluebird, always a bluebird,” read one. Another said: “We never saw you play, we never saw you score but Emiliano, our beautiful bluebird, we will love you forever.” What was meant to be a minute of pre-match silence turned into a period of applause.

Life goes on; football goes on. But how to focus? Cardiff showed their professionalism and they ought to have led at the interval. Bobby Reid blew two clear chances while Oumar Niasse was denied a penalty when Nacho Monreal nibbled at him inside the area.

Ecuele Manga made two rash penalty-box challenges on Lacazette in the first half and the Arsenal fans howled when Mike Dean refused to penalise him. Lacazette did not make a meal out of the first and, perhaps, he made too much of the second.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Cardiff fans pay tribute to missing striker Emiliano Sala. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian

Dean had no option but to point to the spot when Ecuele Manga erred again, lungingin on Sead Kolasinac, who had been released by the half-time substitute, Alex Iwobi. Aubameyang’s goal was his 18th of the season in all competitions.

Arsenal had offered little in the first half, bar an early Lacazette shot which was blocked by Ecuele Manga and a Shkodran Mustafi header that flashed wide. But they were better after the break, when Iwobi and a switch to 4-2-3-1 brought more urgency.

Iwobi was denied by Neil Etheridge before Lacazette scored when he outstripped Bamba and shot into the bottom corner. It might have been different had Mustafi not made a saving challenge on Niasse in the 65th minute. The story of the match, though, was of a club attempting to work through its grief.