Ex-Chelsea man Pat Nevin believes that Arsenal could potentially lose the services of key defender Laurent Koscielny.
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Nevin feels that Arsenal’s capitulation following Koscielny’s departure was no coincidence and added that the Gunners could be in danger of losing the services of their star centre-half soon.
If you think Arsenal’s woes come down to its roster, you need only look at PSG’s masterclass against Barcelona on Wednesday (AEDT).
“It can’t be allowed to happen that one player is the core and everything falls apart without him”. The last 25 minutes were a nightmare for us as we had no response.
With the Arsenal backline, and midfielder Francis Coquelin in particular, failing to press, Robben cut inside and curled a sumptuous effort into the top corner of Gunners stopper David Ospina’s net to give Bayern a 13th minute lead.
After three straight semifinal exits in the competition, Bayern turned to Carlo Ancelotti in the hope of better fortune.
“It’s time for him (Ozil) to score again”. But there is only so much a goalkeeper can do if there is no competent defence line in front of him and Thomas Muller got his first goal in 15 matches in dying minutes of the match and what could be Arsenal’s Champions League campaign.
Arsenal beat Bayern 2-0 in Munich in 2013, but still lost the last-16 tie following a 3-1 defeat in the first leg in London as the Germans went on to win that year’s final at Wembley.
The teams know each other well, having met six times in the last four years, and Bayern thrashed the Gunners 5-1 in Munich in their previous meeting in November 2015.
“It is hard to explain”, Wenger told BT Sport.
Lewandowski was at the heart of the third goal too, as he knocked an impudent backheel into Thiago’s path.
It stayed level until the break and the visitors appeared reasonably happy given they were second best for most of the half.
Chances towards the end of the first period continued to be created with Lewandowski and Mats Hummels both missing the target with headers, while Ozil found himself clear in on goal with just seconds of the half remaining, yet he was unable to find a way past Neuer.
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Bayern Munich take a big advantage to Arsenal for the second leg of their last 16 tie. “Wenger has the experience to know that in our job it’s normal to be criticised, so I think that for this reason he has no problem”, the Bayern manager said. “In these kinds of games, you need a bit of luck going in your side and you need to be focused for 90 minutes”. I feel for him – he nearly needs to be protected from himself.
