Arsenal’s club secretary, David Miles, says manager Arsene Wenger will be excited at the prospect of a Champions League showdown with his former club Monaco.
The Frenchman enjoyed a successful seven year stint at the Stade Louis II between 1987-1994, winning the Ligue 1 title and the Coupe de France, and admitted at the weekend he’d revel in a reunion 20 years on from his exit.
In Nyon, where he watched the Gunners avoid recent winners Real Madrid, Barcelona and Bayern Munich, Miles said of the draw:
“We’re very much looking forward to the games and once again being at the top table of European football.
“We’ve picked some of the biggest teams in Europe over the past five years, but we’re certainly not taking anything for granted. They’ve earned the right to be here as we have and we’re looking forward to two really good games.
“It’s the first time we’re going to play Monaco in a competitive match so I’m sure Arsene will be delighted to go back to one of his former teams.
“The fans have got high expectations for us and as you rightly say it would be great to get through this round of 16 and then press on and kick on from there. We’re taking nothing for granted but we’re pleased with the draw.”
Thank you Falcao. #OneRadamel
Not sure he will given the circumstances he left Monaco. He might be happy to avoid big clubs in the next round though.
Hasn’t he said that he holds no grievances against Monaco and the staff at the time? Wenger only took the match-fixing beef with Marseille with him
He took Boro Primorac with him as well, who was Arsene’s closest ally during that dicey brouhaha with smooth criminal Tapie.
Quite nice to have “Arsenal vs Monaco” being a fixture in which Wnger wil feature heavily in the record books. Having managed both clubs, achieved success with both, now also managing in the first competitive fixture between the two clubs, in the knockout pgase of Europe’s elite competition. A sort of testimonial of weird sorts, if you will.
It’s also quite nice (If serendipitous wasn’t such a stupid word i’d be tempted to use it, but I won’t..) in that we’ve arguably gotten an easier draw than the winners of our group.
The lads should just fucking do it for Arsene. COYG!!!
#arsene’swinningusthechampionsleauge
You were so close until the end…
Time to dust off the old magic hat, Arsene. We could be looking a pretty tidy side in a couple of months time (the talent in the squad, especially going forward, is probably the best we’ve had at least since 2008) and a nice little European cup run would make my season. Facing Bayern with Sanogo up top, much as I like the lad, is quite a different prospect to fielding a combination of Walcott, Alexis Sanchez, Welbeck, Ozil, and Giroud. Not to mention the quality of players like the Ox, Ramsey, Jack, Santi and Podolski. Now, if we only… Read more »
Or a back 4
I don’t want our players to take the draw lightly. The last thing I want is our team being complacent. COYG, march to the last eight!
I think they’ll up for it. Its a real chance to make it to the last 8, one better than we’ve done in the last few years. That wont be lost on them.
*They’ll be
I second your point. We won’t have the like of Ronaldo, Messi, Neymar in front of us for sure. Instead, we will have Berbatov. Let’s do not laugh too fast, remember we were down 0-2 against Hull in FA final and clearly lost the Carling cup to a small team. Now Monaco is not even a small team.
Far from it. They’re rich bastards who are buying a team like Citeh did. Quoting Wikipedia (a stupid thing to do) we have:
“Using Rybolovlev’s funds, Monaco were one of the biggest spenders in Europe in 2013, spending roughly £140 million, including a club record £50 million for Radamel Falcao from Atletico Madrid.”
Luckily that’s one £50 million player we won’t have to face 🙂
Luckily it looks as though Rybolovlev is getting bored, and they’ve gotten rid of Falcao and Jamez Rodiguez in the past transfer window and don’t really look to be buying comparable replacements…
That is the issue with being a billionaire’s plaything. You never know when they’re gonna get bored.
Come on Roman; have you considered sailing or something instead?
Complacency is one word that you wouldn’t find in their dictionary. Stoke, Anderlecht, Hull, Leceister, Swansea and Southampton have ensured that. They will be fired up for this one, believe me.
I have watched Monaco a lot this season; not a spectacular team but only difficult to beat.
However, a team with Alexis, Walcott, Welbeck, Ozil, Carzola, Ox, Ramsey, Giroud, Debuchy, Kos and others will be hotter than anyrhing they have faced this season and I fully expect them to crumble under the waves of attack that will be their lot. They have a fantastic keeper in Subatic though.
You Silly Man Manny Man, you can’t just throw out a list ike that.
We’re The Arsenal.
At least three of those are likely to be injured when we play Monaco.
I am certain Arsene will be going to church more often.
I hope the search for a non cup tied central defender has been going well. With players coming back from injury, a defensive addition or two and we could give it a right rattle this year.
Are you basing that on the fact we always do well in big matches?
We seem to at least be doing better in them this year. With a good performance at Anfield I might start to believe in change.
And we do better in big European matches than in League.
Problem is, Anderlecht wasn’t supposed to be ‘big’. But they made Dortmund work for it too.
A cup tied defender would be fine, I can’t image us getting anyone better than Kos-Per in January and we want our best pairing for this to play, but having someone that allows us to rest them in the other fixtures is key.
Reports emerging from South America saying that Alexis’ girlfriend has dumped him as he was too tired to shag from playing too much football….
Or that he had, allegedly, been messaging another woman.
Also, it is quite well publicised that the reason he was tired was for the complete opposite reason. Every night apparently….
Hi Mark
Hello. I see you are rather aptly named.
What I like about this draw is how everyone (Ozil said so also) can come out and say Wenger is super happy about it. And you can’t even criticize him for being disrespectful to the opponent because its his former club…though we all know why hes happy ;). Not Barca/Real/Bayern
*Why he’s happy ;).
Because he’ll get to play volleyball on the beach again, silly!
Wenger’s prayers came through lol
Chuffed at the draw…at last we have a chance.
All our player’s should be back by then. Coyg
Would love to have a fully fit squad… I can’t remember the last time it has happened at The Arsenal!
Didn’t Danskin get injured in our third game? Been an injury rollercoaster ride ever since.
Fingers crossed but if we get to Feb with no new long term injuries and successful returns for Theo, kos, ozil, arteta, ramsey – we have a big chance of making a real statement.
Jack as well
Obviously the best draw we could hope for in the circumstances but don’t write off Monaco as pushovers – Carvalho, Kondogbia, Moutinho, Toulalan and Berbatov are all players capable of causing us problems on their day. Let’s just hope that we go into the game with as strong a squad as possible and able to do ourselves justice.
That’s if they’re all still there. Remember they shipped Falcao out on deadline day and they’re only sixth in the league
“…and they’re only sixth in the league”
…
Funny, some people in France are delighted Monaco drew us, instead of City, Juventus, and… Bale. Well don’t worry, we’re as happy as you to have drawn the worst group leader, who scored a massive… 4 goals.
I remember looking at the draw on both sides and thinking that there were few “weak” sides. Usually, we go into the last 16 being the team everyone wants to avoid, but this season the second placed spots were filled with strong teams: Man City, PSG, Juve, Arsenal. Schalke and Leverkusen are pretty good on their day as well. While we were very happy to get Monaco, I’m pretty sure Monaco are also happy to avoid the English and Italian champions. Makes sense. I’m sure they would have preferred to go to Donetsk but Arsenal wasn’t the worst team to… Read more »
Monaco are defensively quite strong, but there are few goals in their side. They don’t have a 20 goal striker. I’d expect them to be cautious over both games, try to keep Arsenal out and take whatever chances they get. If Arsenal have their shooting boots on, there can be only one winner. Monaco v Arsenal is an attractive fixture for the French media but Arsenal are clear favourites and no serious journalist would say the opposite.
So in other words, every journo in England will now pick Monaco to win the tie.
so Arsene went to church then…. #maybethereisagod
I don’t think we could have asked for much better!! 😀
Arsene should go to Church every day!
Pray to the injury gods first (focus on Koscielny), then maybe world peace next.
Big prize for Wenger CL
Team still not consistent enough for the league
But you never know with the cup and some lucky draws ahead.
Quality CBack needed in Jan
Plenty of goals in this team but depth at Cback non existent
We will be best off with someone with quality and immediate impact however others are in the hunt too. United are looking at Hummels priced at 47m quid.
Doubt Wenger will be up for that price bracket. Player sentiment could come to play( he is fond of us) but likely Wenger will look toward a creative solution in case.
Heh, funny, FWIW, on Friday I thought hey why not roll the dice and see who we’re going to play, it’s as random and useless as any other speculation. I knew that it still had to be Bayern or Real, but I figured I could be entertained by the prospect of another club for us to play. So, I actually assigned each team that we could face from the draw a number 1-6 and rolled 60 dice one time (using a random dice roller found online). Tallied up the results, and it came out Monaco. I snickered, and thought that… Read more »
Crazy Friday night huh.
Gilberto Silva has been offered a coaching position at Arsenal
http://globoesporte.globo.com/sc/noticia/2014/12/gilberto-silva-busca-clube-para-2015-e-cultiva-planos-para-quando-parar.html
Wenger’s a gambling man. He’ll fit right in at Monte Carlo.