FULL TIME: Arsenal 1-5 Bayern Munich (agg: 2-10)
The whistle. Half-arsed boos. Wenger walks down the tunnel looking utterly deflated. Bayern register their third 5-1 victory over Arsenal in a row. This is Arsenal’s biggest loss at the Emirates to date, and they go crashing out of the Champions League in embarrassing style. Thing is, they played well tonight up until the penalty and red card, and none of the big decisions went their way. But given what happened afterwards, none of that really matters. It’s one thing being ultimately outclassed - there’s no shame in losing to this Bayern Munich side - but another capitulating totally. The mood around the Emirates is resigned and funereal; it feels like the end of days at Arsenal. It’s going to be an interesting climax to their season all right, one way or another. Last word to Stuart Goodacre: “Just to say that we - Lincoln - have scored four goals tonight. Roll on Saturday!”
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90 min: There will be three more minutes of this. 180 seconds that will seem like 180 years to Arsenal.
89 min: Bellerin, from the right of the Bayern D, looks for a consolation. His low shot isn’t far away from the bottom left, but whistles wide.
87 min: The Bayern fans are giving it plenty. They can be heard quite clearly, to be fair. The Arsenal fans are in the pit of despair. On the touchline, Arsene Wenger looks beyond miserable. Alexis Sanchez allows himself a wry, thin-lipped grimace.
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GOAL! Arsenal 1-5 Bayern Munich (Vidal 85); agg 2-10
This is painful. Renato Sanches, from deep, splits the Arsenal defence with one pass. Douglas Costa, down the inside-left channel, draws Ospina before laying inside for Vidal, who sidefoots into an empty net.
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83 min: Renato Sanches slips a ball down the left for the overlapping Alaba, who nearly finds Kimmich six yards out with a low whip into the centre. Inches away from a third 5-1 in a row against Arsenal. “Can Arsenal use some of their millions to arrange for, say, a spaceship to land on the pitch and have the game abandoned?” wonders Charles Antaki. “Or maybe the pitch could gently descend into one of those sink-holes we hear so much about? Or just offer the ref lots of cash to blow for time. Anything, really, to stop it all.”
81 min: Incidentally, between those two body blows for Arsenal, Bayern made a double change, sending on Kimmich and Renato Sanches in place of Thiago and Ribery.
GOAL! Arsenal 1-4 Bayern Munich (Vidal 80); agg 2-9
This is getting embarrassing now, ten men or no. Mustafi passes out straight to Alonso, who slips the ball forward for Vidal. He’s clear. He clips the ball over the outrushing Ospina, and into the net.
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GOAL! Arsenal 1-3 Bayern Munich (Douglas Costa 78); agg 2-8
Rafinha zips up the right and is scythed down by Xhaka, who will be booked for that. Costa takes up possession on the halfway line, reaches the area, cuts inside Robben-style, and curls an unstoppable shot past Ospina into the left.
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77 min: Lewandowski races clear down the inside-left channel. He’s one on one with Ospina, and should score, but over-runs the ball with a heavy touch. Arsenal go up the other end, Bellerin reaching the byline on the right and shooting from a super-tight angle. Bayern clear, go up the other end, and ...
76 min: Lewandowski wins a towering header in the middle of the Arsenal half, holding onto possession before passing to Douglas Costa on his left. Costa enters the Arsenal box and fizzes a low ball back to the striker. Lewandowski, rushing in, meets it well, but his effort batters off the bottom of the right-hand post and away.
74 min: A bit of possession for Arsenal in the middle of the park. Sterile, as a great man once said. “I also don’t see how video replays would help,” writes Liam Westaway. “It would just drag out the process of making bad decisions. And we’d still have to listen to the pundits argue whether said video decision was the correct one and whether player X was just simulating being headbutted to try and force a video replay with the intent of wasting time.”
72 min: A triple change by Arsenal. Ramsey, Giroud and Sanchez come off; Coquelin, Ozil and Lucas Perez take their places.
70 min: Robben, his work done, is replaced by Douglas Costa.
GOAL! Arsenal 1-2 Bayern Munich (Robben 68); agg 2-7
Ospina hacks lamely upfield. Robben intercepts, one-twos with Lewandowski down the right, drops a shoulder to break past a couple of non-existent Arsenal challenges, and whips the ball into the top left as he enters the box.
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66 min: Sanchez, deep in his own half on the left wing, beats four men with a gorgeous dribble. The move goes nowhere, but that’s the best bit of skill we’ve seen all night. Then Bayern hoick long down the left. Lewandowski looks offside, so he stops playing and allows Robben to take over. Robben wins a corner off Ospina, who came way off his line and did well to avert a goal. The corner comes to nothing.
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64 min: Bayern are clearly after a statement victory. Lewandowski one-twos with Vidal down the middle of the park, and he’s clear in the Arsenal box. He lashes a shot towards the top left. Ospina tips round the post, and the resulting corner comes to nothing.
63 min: Ribery dances into the Arsenal box from the left, after a Bayern corner. He flicks the ball up to Thiago, who tries to guide a close-range header into the net, but fails.
61 min: Oxlade-Chamberlain skitters at high speed down the left wing. It’s a great run, but Hummels guides him away from danger, and on the edge of the box Rafinha steals the ball from his toe. Oxlade-Chamberlain can’t stop clattering into Rafinha, who buys a clever free kick to bring the episode to an end. Oxlade-Chamberlain, his frustration getting the better of him, berates the referee for the decision, and can’t complain when he sees yellow. He does complain, mind.
60 min: Alonso dinks a pass down the right wing from the centre circle. He releases Robben into the area, but Ospina comes off his line to block well, and the flag’s gone up for offside anyway.
58 min: That Bayern equaliser was coming, though. The German champions, in the professional style, had clearly come out with a clear remit: ensure Arsenal, who had earned themselves a sliver of hope, were disabused of any fancy notions quicksmart. And so it proved. Bayern are now just stroking it around the middle, and it’s only the travelling support who can be heard.
56 min: Just the four goals, then, and we’re into extra time.
GOAL! Arsenal 1-1 Bayern Munich (Lewandowski 55 pen); agg 2-6
Lewandowski, having earned the penalty kick, steps up, stutters, and slots the ball into the bottom right. There goes that one little scrap of hope, then.
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RED CARD! Koscielny (Arsenal)
54 min: The referee changes his mind and shows Koscielny red!
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Penalty for Bayern Munich!
53 min: A little dink down the middle, and Lewandowski is suddenly in the Arsenal box, shaping to shoot. He’s barged over from behind by Koscielny, who is shown the yellow card after the referee points to the spot.
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51 min: Arsenal are light at the back as Bayern stream forward. Vidal romps down the left and should find one of three grey shirts in the middle, but his cross goes straight over the box towards the other wing. Robben tries to revive the move, but it’s too late.
49 min: A free kick for Bayern near the centre circle. Arsenal are dozing. Alonso magic-wands the set piece down the inside-right, and releases Hummels into the area. Hummels helps the ball into the bottom right of Arsenal’s net. Luckily for the sleepy hosts, Hummels had mistimed his run and was clearly offside. But that was too close for comfort.
48 min: Arsenal are pressing hard in these early exchanges. Mustafi tears down the right and very nearly breaks into the Bayern box. Cleared. Then Arsenal come again, Ramsey spinning down the inside-right channel to make a little space for a dinked cross. Rising in the centre: Giroud, who really should send a header into the top right with Neuer’s feet planted. But he times his jump all wrong, and the header goes high and wide right.
46 min: Robben embarks on a little meander down the right. He nearly releases Ribery into the Arsenal box with a threaded pass, but his team-mate’s touch isn’t what it normally is.
And we’re off again! Arsenal get the ball rolling for the second half. No changes. Three goals are required. They couldn’t, could they? I wonder if Carlo Ancelotti is thinking about Istanbul. Anyway, here’s Neil Truby: “Listen to the BT Sport pundits unable to agree on whether Arsenal should have had a penalty or not, and know that video replays as advocated by every wronged coach ever will in most cases solve nothing.” Preach on, brother.
Half-time reading: Arsenal may go out tonight, but their season will be far from over. They face non-league Lincoln in the FA Cup quarter-finals on Saturday. Donald McRae met Imps boss Danny Cowley, who is preparing his men for the shock to end all shocks: 1933 at Walsall would have nothing on this.
HALF TIME: Arsenal 1-0 Bayern Munich (agg: 2-5)
Nothing happens in the 60 seconds of added time, and so here we are at the three-quarter mark in this tie. Arsenal have played well, Theo Walcott scored a screamer, the Gunners should have had a penalty kick, and Bayern have looked a little shaky at the back. This should be over ... it probably is over ... and yet it isn’t, not quite, not yet. Don’t go anywhere, now, y’all!
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45 min: ... sidefoots a dismal effort straight at Neuer. There will be one added minute of a half that’s flown by.
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44 min: Ramsey turns Javi Martinez down the inside-right channel, and makes for the Bayern box. He’s brought down by Martinez, who is booked. A free kick, just to the right of the D, but a good 30 yards out. Sanchez steps up, and ...
43 min: Vidal crumps the studs of his boot into Sanchez’s cheek (right lower). How he’s not got booked for that is anybody’s guess. The fact that Sanchez was going nowhere fast in the centre circle probably had something to do with it.
41 min: Corner for Bayern down the right. The ball falls to Ribery on the edge of the D. He shapes to shoot, and is robbed by Bellerin. Arsenal swish up the other end. The attack breaks down, allowing Bayern to counter in the basketball style. Robben ends up in possession out on the right. He cuts inside and whistles a bang-average shot down Ospina’s throat. This match is an awful mess, really, neither team in control, but it’s wonderfully exciting.
39 min: Alaba and Walcott are both booked for having the temerity to compete for a loose ball in the middle of the park like adults. Both men rightly look aggrieved. What a preposterous decision.
38 min: Chances at either end, Vidal having a speculative look from distance but firing high, Giroud failing to connect properly when haring after a ball down the inside left. And then the best opportunity of the lot, Robben opening Arsenal up with an exquisite chip down the inside-right channel. Lewandowski is free in the Arsenal box, but the ball’s dropping over his shoulder, and he can only help the ball wide left with a waft of his leg.
36 min: Ramsey busies himself on the edge of the Bayern D, stealing possession from the visitors and looking to get an attack going. He’s clipped to the floor by Vidal, who was already rolling around on it. Arsenal don’t get the free kick. If the Gunners are to turn around this deficit, they need everything to go for them. They’re not getting the crucial decisions right now.
34 min: Mustafi threads a lovely ball down the inside-right channel, releasing the superlative Walcott into the area. Walcott tries to recreate his blistering goal from a similarly tight angle, but lightning ain’t striking twice. Side netting.
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32 min: ... Arsenal should have a penalty kick! Oxlade-Chamberlain dinks a ball down the inside-right channel. Walcott shapes to shoot again from his tight angle, and is clumsily clattered by Alonso from behind. Bayern swarm around him in accusatory fashion, and do a number on Arsenal and the referee. It wasn’t the hardest clatter from Alonso, but there was contact. Arsenal are within their rights to fume.
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31 min: Arsenal buzz around the midfield in packs. The ball’s won in the midfield and dispatched out right for Walcott, whose low, curling cross is hacked out by Javi Martinez for a corner. And from the set piece ...
30 min: Now it’s Bayern’s turn to earn a corner, Lewandowski doing the work for that down the left. Thiago’s ball into the middle is laughably poor, allowing Arsenal to scoot upfield on the counter. Nothing comes of the quick break, but at the moment Bayern look a little rattled.
29 min: From the corner, Ramsey has a whack from distance, but it’s not much to write home about.
28 min: Walcott drives down the right again. His route to the box is cut off, so he slips the ball to Oxlade-Chamberlain, who spins round Alaba adroitly, reaching the byline and winning a corner.
26 min: Bayern appear to have cleared their heads after falling behind. Robben earns a corner down the right, and Arsenal can only half-clear the set piece. Ribery has a dig from distance, though it isn’t very good. A fine response, though, because for a few minutes before and after the goal, Bayern looked slightly shaky.
24 min: Robben slips a ball to Rafinha on the overlap down the right. Rafinha stands one up to the far post, where Vidal rises and crashes a header goalwaards. Ospina stops well. The flag goes up for shoving. Ospina is in the action again a few seconds later, as Lewandowski is sent through the middle by a clever pitching wedge from Thiago. He parries again, though the flag went up in any case.
22 min: Arsenal are now first to mostly everything. A rare moment of possession for Bayern sees Ribery attempt to romp down the left. He is clattered, legally, by Bellerin. The crowd are enjoying themselves here.
WHAT A GOAL! Arsenal 1-0 Bayern Munich (Walcott 20); agg 2-5
Walcott has been electric from the get-go. He puts his head down and tears down the inside-right channel, skating past Alonso and Alaba as though they weren’t there. He enters the box, and though he’s got men in the middle and faces a tight angle, with Neuer in the way, he shoots. Wallop! Skelp! He lashes a riser past Neuer, who was beaten for pace, and sends the ball into the roof of the net! What a finish! It couldn’t be on, could it?! Just the three required now.
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19 min: Mustafi comes through the back of Ribery in the centre circle. The referee doesn’t show the yellow card, though you’ve seen those given in Europe.
18 min: Oxlade-Chamberlain floats a cross into the Bayern box from the right. Walcott, of all players, rises highest to compete in the middle, but the ball flies off Javi Martinez for a corner on the left. The set piece comes to nothing - Giroud is penalised for shoving - but Arsenal are asking a few questions.
16 min: But this is good from Arsenal. Walcott drives at Alaba down the inside-right channel. A smarter touch as he enters the box would have earned him space to shoot, but he runs into trouble. Sanchez tries to re-energise the move, latching onto a half-cleared ball, but he too runs into bother.
15 min: Bayern, who were gently rocking there for a couple of minutes, take the sting out of the situation by faffing around in the middle of the park. The Emirates falls quiet again.
13 min: ... Arsenal nearly score. Bayern make a pig’s lug of clearing the corner. The ball bounces around by the left-hand post. Xhaka hooks it across the face of goal. Giroud rises, and should plant a header on target, but his downward effort sails inches wide of the right-hand post. He grimaces theatrically. An early Arsenal goal, and you never know. (Well, you probably do, but ... y’know.)
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12 min: Arsenal are trying to up the tempo. Bellerin scampers after a pass down the right, and twists Alaba inside and out. He can’t get a cross into the box, though, and has to make do with a corner off Alaba. From which ...
10 min: Some hope for Arsenal here. Walcott is nearly sprung clear down the right wing, but he’s caught offside. Arsenal give the long pass another go a minute later, and this time Walcott is free down the middle! He nearly latches onto the ball, but Neuer is out quickly from his box and blooters clear. That’s got the crowd going again; they’d fallen quiet, anxious after all that Bayern probing.
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8 min: Robben skitters infield from the right wing. No challenges, almost as though nothing has been learned from the other week. He enters the box and takes a shot, which balloons off Monreal for a corner on the left. Alonso’s set piece is worked to Alaba, to the left of the D. Alaba shoots high and wide right. He should have done better. Arsenal’s defence should have done better too. That was all a bit laissez-faire.
6 min: Bayern get their foot on the ball and pass it around the middle awhile. Ribery has a probe down the left; Robben takes a look down the right. They’re beginning to find a little rhythm, hogging possession, all of which is ominous for Arsenal.
4 min: Sanchez scampers after a long ball down the Arsenal left. He can’t get on the end of it, but there’s a bit of early determination by the home heroes. “Let’s just for play for guts and glory and for the best manager we’ve ever had!” cries Tod O’Brien.
2 min: The pitch is cleared of all that toilet roll. Quite a few rolls. Everyone’s a critic. Speaking of which, here’s Charles Antaki: “It’s just a matter pf what sort of dismalness can be expected of Arsenal tonight. Full on early capitulation, initial hope plus inevitable decisive loss, or some combination of that plus season-ending, profit-reducing injury to Sánchez. Or they might even win, 6-1.”
And we’re off! Bayern get the ball rolling, and launch it long to little effect. Bellerin prepares to take a throw, and has to wait for the best par of a minute as the far end of the pitch is cleared of ticker tape and toilet roll. Marvellously farcical.
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The teams are out! One hell of an atmosphere, despite it all. And there’s a change to the Arsenal team: Danny Welbeck has managed to fall sick during the warm-up - there’s a bug going round all right - and is replaced by Olivier Giroud. Arsenal are in their famous red and white. Bayern play in their second-choice grey and black. We’ll be off in a minute. “Bayern haven’t lost a competitive match since 23 November 2016 and Franck Ribery is in fine form,” begins Peter Oh. “Still, you have a point. ‘Never’ might be too strong. To borrow a line from the crooners Richard Marx and Bryan Adams, how about ‘next to never’?” A reference to the soft-rock classic Right Here Waiting, there, pop pickers. I see that one’s off Marx’s album Repeat Offender. Probably no need to go any further down this road.
Arsene Wenger, manager of the Arsenal since 1996, speaks! “I want our fans to be happy. I work very hard, and at the moment I don’t achieve that, so I am not happy. I am at the end of my contract at the end of the season, and I will give my best until the last day. If I sign a new one, I will give my best again. I have not made my decision. The only thing I can say is: this is my 201st Champions League game. I hope it is not my last one.”
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A pre-match word with Bayern boss Carlo Ancelotti, who is asked if he plans to show Arsenal any mercy. “No.”
Never Say Never dept. A four-goal turnaround in European competition? Yes, it’s unlikely, but it’s not totally beyond the realms. Here’s the story of one such comeback, Alan Mullery’s QPR the victims of Partizan Belgrade’s recovery in the 1984/85 Uefa Cup.
Arsenal swap four players from the XI named at Liverpool last Saturday. David Ospina, Aaron Ramsey, Theo Walcott and Alexis Sanchez step up; Petr Cech, Alex Iwobi, Francis Coquelin and Olivier Giroud step down. Iwobi has phoned in sick; the formerly ill Mesut Ozil is back on the bench.
Bayern make five changes from the team sent out to beat Cologne 3-0 on Saturday. Rafinha, Mats Hummels, Xabi Alonso, Franck Ribery and Arjen Robben are in; Juan Bernat, Philipp Lahm, Douglas Costa, Kingsley Coman and Thomas Muller are out.
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Tonight's teams
Arsenal: Ospina, Bellerin, Mustafi, Koscielny, Monreal, Ramsey, Xhaka, Walcott, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Welbeck, Sanchez.
Subs: Cech, Gibbs, Gabriel, Coquelin, Ozil, Lucas, Giroud.
Bayern Munich: Neuer, Rafinha, Martinez, Hummels, Alaba, Alonso, Vidal, Thiago, Robben, Lewandowski, Ribery.
Subs: Ulreich, Costa, Bernat, Muller, Coman, Kimmich, Sanches.
Referee: Tasos Sidiropoulos (Greece).
Good evening
pipe dream n. an illusory or fantastic plan, hope or story
Let’s put Arsenal’s task here in some sort of perspective. They need to recover a four-goal first-leg deficit tonight at the Emirates. Some job, as only three clubs have ever managed to achieve that in Uefa competition. Leixões SC responded to a 6-2 defeat at La Chaux-de-Fonds in the first round, first leg of the 1961/62 European Cup Winners’ Cup by triumphing 5-0 in the return. FK Partizan lost by the same scoreline, 6-2, at Queens Park Rangers in the second round of the 1984/85 Uefa Cup only to progress after a 4-0 victory at home. And Real Madrid overturned a 5-1 first-leg loss at Borussia Mönchengladbach in the 1985/86 Uefa Cup, winning the return 4-0. But that’s your lot.
In addition, Arsenal’s opposition tonight is Bayern Munich, who have beaten them 10-2 on aggregate in their last two meetings. While Arsenal faff around in the Premier League, Bayern are running away with the Bundesliga. They’ve won 14 of their last 16 matches in all competitions, drawing the other two; by comparison, Arsenal have lost four of their last six, only managing to beat Hull City and Sutton United during that time. In addition, Bayern have knocked Arsenal out at this stage three times in the last dozen years; Arsenal haven’t got past this round since 2010. Finally, the mood music around the Emirates hasn’t been tuneful for some time now: Wenger, Sanchez, Troopz, all that. All in all, a pipe dream is probably talking things up.
And yet, and yet ... this is football! You never know. You just never know. England’s most memorable stories in the Champions League have always begun with teams getting themselves into awful scrapes, only to extricate themselves somehow from seemingly impossible pickles. Just ask Manchester United (1999), Liverpool (2005) and Chelsea (2012). Time for Arsenal to add their name to that magical list?
Well, let’s be realistic, no. No, no, no, no, no. But then again: maybe! And you’ll thank me for tempting fate if they pull this off. Actually, what’s the point of watching sport if you can’t indulge in a little outrageous hope? Come on, then, let’s see what you can do, Arsenal. It almost certainly isn’t on. But it’s on!
Kick off: 7.45pm in north London, 8.45pm back in Munich.
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