{"id":11356,"date":"2025-06-12T21:01:03","date_gmt":"2025-06-12T20:01:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=11356"},"modified":"2025-06-18T21:37:42","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T20:37:42","slug":"arsenal-become-a-european-powerhouse-part-3-of-this-seasons-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=11356","title":{"rendered":"Arsenal become a European Powerhouse (part 3 of this season&#8217;s review)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color:#fff;display:inline-block;font-family:Roboto,sans-serif;color:#a7a7a7;font-size:11px;width:100%;max-width:594px;\"><div style=\"padding:0;margin:0;text-align:left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2210974318\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\" rel=\"noopener\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><\/div><div style=\"overflow:hidden;position:relative;height:0;padding:75.420876% 0 0 0;width:100%;\"><iframe src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/2210974318?et=TMiiMuRQRxtEoLtjkMHEKw&amp;tld=com&amp;sig=xQWluIqLP1ZxsLTJeU02pifyjDgaqQ5QI7N_55uwI8U=&amp;caption=true&amp;ver=1\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"594\" height=\"448\" style=\"display:inline-block;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;margin:0;\"><\/iframe><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Last season\u2019s experience of the Champions League had been encouraging but ultimately frustrating, and had ended just as it so often did under Wenger, with an exit at the hands of Bayern Munich. This season, with a new expanded league system, there would&nbsp;be more games to play and it was likely that there would&nbsp;be fewer dead rubbers (as only eight of the original thirty two clubs would be eliminated in the group stage). Arsenal were one of the best defensive sides in the world but the worry was whether they could score key goals in tight matches and whether their squad was big enough to sustain a challenge in the Champions League as well as the Premier League.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Our first game in Europe came&nbsp; in a very challenging week. Atalanta had won the Europa League in the previous season and were a formidable side at home. An eccentric penalty decision (not the last we would encounter in Italy) threatened to increase the size of our task but Raya made a brilliant double save. A goalless draw represented a decent start to the new league phase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sandwiched between two games in the Premier League with&nbsp;teams who would subsequently be relegated came a very different challenge &#8211; Paris Saint Germain in the Champions League. We rose to the occasion brilliantly. Havertz headed in a cross that Donnarumma hesitated on and he then let an innocuous Saka free kick past him just before halftime. In the second half PSG huffed and puffed but Arsenal repelled them easily. It was a rivalry that was to be continued later in the season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We next took on Shakhtar Donetsk in N5. There is always a huge degree of sympathy and compassion for any Ukrainian side in competition at the moment. Shakhtar were obdurate opponents and only went down to a 28th minute own goal by Riznyk which had significant good fortune attached to it from an Arsenal perspective. We were yet to concede a goal at home this season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Arsenal&#8217;s league form had dipped by the time of our next European game, which was one of the most testing in the group stage at the Giuseppe Meazza against Inter Milan. This game underlined just what a formidable opponent Arsenal can be as they had by far the better of the game. An extremely fortunate penalty awarded in first half injury time for handball against Merino was converted by Calhanoglu. The second half was close to a unremitting siege of the Inter goal with great saves by Sommer and a number of goal-line clearances. It represented a very unlucky 1-0 defeat and was to be&nbsp;Arsenal&#8217;s only defeat in the group stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When Arsenal went to Lisbon in late November their position in the group league was not particularly impressive, in keeping with their form in their games so far. That was to change against Sporting. Arsenal were ahead in 6 minutes through Martinelli, and Havertz and Gabriel increased the lead before the interval. Sporting threatened briefly after the break, pulling a goal back but a Saka penalty and a Trossard goal completed a 5-1 rout. There was much interest in the form of Viktor Gyokeres, the prolific Sporting striker who is perpetually linked with Arsenal. He struggled manfully but was well marshalled by Saliba and Gabriel. As we moved towards the turn of the year we were starting to look very well-placed to qualify automatically from the group phase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This feeling strengthened after we beat Monaco 3-0 at home with Saka scoring twice and Havertz continuing his consistent scoring streak in Europe. We were now up to third in the table with two (winnable) games to go. The first of these was at home to Dinamo Zagreb in late January. A very early Rice goal was followed by later goals from Havertz and \u00d8degaard. A win in our last group game against Girona in Spain would ensure that we qualified in the top 8.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When we played in Girona we rested Raya and Neto came in for his first game in goal. His performance was sufficiently eccentric to alarm Gooners everywhere. Danjuma, formerly of Tottnumb, scored with a spectacular shot (wildly against the run of play) which Neto tried to punch away while outside the penalty area. Had he connected he would have been red-carded and it could have resulted in serious ramifications for our bid for the top 8. We were ahead before halftime through a Jorginho penalty and an excellent Nwaneri finish, which&nbsp;enabled us to close the group stage in style. Close to the end of the game we were awarded a penalty and rather like Havertz was at Bournemouth last season, Sterling was invited to take it. He didn\u2019t score (to nobody\u2019s great surprise). It summed up a very lacklustre spell at Arsenal which never gave us a&nbsp;glimpse of the player who had lit up the Euros a few years ago. He proved a very poor loan signing. It would be unfair to classify Neto the same way but it is fair to say that nobody was keen to see him in goal in any future games! He was meant to give Raya the&nbsp;occasional breather but was never picked again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We were third in the final overall group&nbsp;table behind Liverpool and Barcelona and this obviated the need to play two extra games to qualify for the knockout stages. We knew that when we reached the last 16 we would play PSV Eindhoven who had surprisingly eliminated Juventus. We expected the tie to be manageable but surely no Gooner expected us to smash the tie to pieces in the way that we did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The first game in Eindhoven was expected to be difficult. As mentioned they had eliminated Juventus and we were missing Saka, Havertz and Gabriel Jesus, so expected goals to be at a premium. Timber, Nwaneri and Merino, now playing upfront, gave us an interval lead although a late first half penalty suggested a possible PSV revival. It was not to be. \u00d8degaard and Trossard scored&nbsp;in the first two minutes of the second half before \u00d8degaard and Calafiori rounded off&nbsp;a resounding 7-1 victory. There were Gooners who protested about ticket prices for the return which was inevitably a low key game. Zinchenko gave us the lead and Rice restored it after Perisic had equalised. Driouech got an excellent second for PSV in the second half but a professional job was done 9-3 on aggregate. Travelling home with a group of Gooners I watched as Real Madrid fortuitously won a penalty shootout against Atletico. The consensus was that while it was thrilling to welcome them to Ashburton Grove, their quality would be too much for a depleted Arsenal side to deal with. Then Gabriel pulled his hamstring before the first leg&nbsp;although Saka had returned from his long absence to face Real.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When we welcomed them for the quarter-final home leg we little expected what might follow. A full, raucous Emirates witnessed a quite momentous night. During an exciting first half we tested Courtois and went very&nbsp;close,&nbsp; Partey even being prevented from scoring by hitting Saliba on the line. If the first half was good the second was incandescent! Declan Rice produced two of the greatest moments in recent Arsenal history with two exquisite free kicks&nbsp;that Gooners everywhere watched on repeat for days. When Merino clipped home a third from a Lewis- Skelly cross it began to dawn on us that we had a very realistic chance of eliminating the holders. Between the two legs we were bombarded with claims that the great Real Madrid were going to pull off &#8216;Remontada&#8217; in the Bernabeu &#8211; the great revival &#8211; as they had so&nbsp;many times before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I found the game incredibly hard to watch but again it gradually became obvious that Arsenal were the superior side despite Saka missing an early penalty. We had a strong ref and he was not influenced by the histrionics of the Madrid players. When Saka finished a clever move to put us ahead midway through the second half the tie was effectively over despite Saliba making a very rare mistake just after we scored to enable Vinicius to score. In the last minute Merino sent Martinelli away to score to&nbsp;ensure that we maintained our 100% record at the Bernabeu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>PSG stood between us and the final of the Champions League.&nbsp; Although we had beaten PSG earlier in the competition it was obvious seeing them play Liverpool,&nbsp;Villa and Manchester City in the interim that they were a much stronger team now. Kvaratskelia had joined, Doue was blossoming, Vitinha was rapidly becoming a superstar and Dembele was a real handful. He illustrated this in the early minutes of the first leg turning home Kvaratskelia&#8217;s cross. For the first quarter of the game they were irresistible and we were hanging on but gradually we played our way into the game and had Merino&#8217;s headed goal not been ruled out by VAR in the early minutes of the second half we would have probably gone on to win. Donnarumma made up for his awful night in the Autumn by making some brilliant saves but at 1-0 down we were not out of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Our performance in the first half of the second leg was astonishing. For the first ten minutes we battered them, with Donnarumma making a number of extraordinary saves. But we trailed 1-0 at the interval because Ruiz had put PSG ahead with a fierce drive that deflected off Saliba. When Hakimi doubled that lead with another fine goal in the second half the gap was too big although Saka pulled a goal back and we continued to put PSG under extreme pressure right to the end of the tie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last season when we lost to Bayern in the quarter finals there was a general feeling that we lacked&nbsp;the big game nous to compete at the sharp end of the Champions League.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nothing could be further from the truth this season. Finishing third in the extended group stage was an indication that we ranked alongside the very best in Europe. Huge wins in Lisbon and Eindhoven showed that we had the ability to destroy teams on their own ground and the performances against Real Madrid and PSG confirmed that we are a bona fide European powerhouse. When the knives are occasionally brandished for Arteta let it be remembered&nbsp;that he has orchestrated the creation of a side that will start next season&#8217;s competition as one of the favourites. That is a substantial achievement and one of the signs of the growing power that is developing at Arsenal . PSG showed in the final that they are an extraordinary team and we did not look out of place against them. Their performance in the Final showed the chasm between them and the teams that played that ghastly Europa League Final.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The biggest challenge is navigating the Champions League and the Premier League together. We are not in a position to do what&nbsp;Postecoglou claimed Spurs did when their league form went to pot because expectations at Arsenal are understandably high. We have proved ourselves a European superpower this season and any drop from those standards will be hard to accept. Certainly we have to acquire five or six first-team standard players that we can rotate to prevent the fatigue and inexperience that held us back this season,&nbsp;although we made a magnificent fist of our European campaign this year. The memories from the two Madrid games will stay with supporters for the rest of their lives. Very few sides rivalled the quality and incisiveness that we showed against Sporting and PSV, and our first game with PSG underlined how much more mature we were as we locked their star- studded team out of the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We have made a gigantic leap in the quality and resilience of our play and our European exploits underline this better than anything else. Two seasons ago Sporting eliminated us from the Europa League. This season we destroyed them in Lisbon a matter of weeks after they had pulverised C130y. But teambuilding is a relentless business and we must ensure that our squad enables us to take a quantum leap to potential glory in Europe next season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Embed from Getty Images Last season\u2019s experience of the Champions League had been encouraging but ultimately frustrating, and had ended just as it so often did under Wenger, with an exit at the hands of Bayern Munich. This season, with a new expanded league system, there would&nbsp;be more games to play and it was likely [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[24,20],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11356"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11356"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11356\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11364,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11356\/revisions\/11364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}