The first set of Champions League semifinalists were established yesterday with Paris St. Germain smashing past a 10-man Barcelona while Borussia Dortmund had enough in the tank to see off the threat of Atletico Madrid. Prior to the quarterfinals, the Spanish clubs were touted to qualify from their clashes against opposition ranked lower than them in the competition, but yesterday’s games proved that at the end of the day, it’s the aggregate result that matters.
After a heart breaking loss suffered at the hands of a former manager, Unai Emery, and his Aston Villa vying for the Champions League places, Mikel Arteta has to rally his troops to battle in one of the feared European grounds, the Allianz Arena.
While Bayern Munich struggled to make this work domestically this season, they have been a different animal in the Champions League and their quality was on show when they took their chances superbly at the Emirates, when Arsenal faltered defensively.
Still, going into the second leg with a 2-2 scoreline means that both sides have to go for it in the contest, with UEFA scrapping the away goal rules that made games so cagey.
Arsenal will go into this game knowing that anything less than a win will not be able to allow them reach the semifinals, which happened last as far back as the 2008/09 season. The Gunners lost 1-0 to Manchester United courtesy of a John O’ Shea and the Emirates was buzzing for what was going to be a monumental second leg, but a slip from Kieran Gibbs early on allowed Park Ji-Sung to place the ball past Manuel Almunia, then the Arsenal goalie conceded a ridiculous free kick from Cristiano Ronaldo. A counter attack saw Wayne Rooney and Ronaldo combine for the third goal before the Gunners got a consolation goal from Robin van Persie.
Since then, Arsenal has been in the trenches when it comes to European football.
Enough with the history lessons. What matters is here and now. Arsenal has an uphill task tonight and Mikel Arteta will need to select 11 warriors that will go to battle tonight. Some playing positions are certainly sorted with the likes of David Raya, Gabriel, William Saliba, Ben White, Declan Rice, Martin Odegaard and Bukayo Saka assured of their starting berths. I want to dwell a bit on the other playing positions with some options for the manager to ponder on.
The first is left back. Oleksandr Zinchenko is Arsenal’s first choice left back but his defensive frailties have plagued him for the best part of his Arsenal career. Jakub Kiwior has deptuized in that position a couple of times, na features there regularly for his nation, Poland, but he was roasted by Leroy Sane in the first leg, causing his gaffer to yank him off at half time. I would opt for Takehiro Tomiyasu in that position tonight, to provide some security in that position and allow Rice to m on be to the left 8 position to accommodate the next position I want to discuss about, #6.
In an ideal world, I would have loved Thomas Partey to play the anchor role tonight alongside Rice, but the Ghanaian has not been the same since his return from his long term thigh injury, so I’d opt for the midfield metronome, Jorginho, whose ability to dictate tempo alongside his playmaking traits will be vital to Arsenal in the heart of midfield.
With Bukayo Saka strutting his stuff from the right and Kai Havertz playing as a de-facto center forward, Arteta will need to make a judgment call on who to play at left wing, with Leandro Trossard, Gabriel Martinelli and Gabriel Jesus the likely contenders. I will play Jesus in that position, so that we can latch unto his experiences in this competition, as well as the support he can grant to Tomiyasu to negate the threat posed from Sane.
It’s going to be an enthralling game of football tonight and I’m here for the ride. Hopefully, tomorrow’s blog post will be one written with loads of joy, not despair.
It doesn’t get any bigger than this.
Sayonara.
Leave a Reply