As we all know Arsenal will go out against Barcelona or Bayern Munich in the first knockout round of the Champions League, but before that, we’ll just scrape through the group stage after fixtures with Paris Saint Germain, FC Basel and Bulgarian outfit FC Ludogorets.
Arsenal haven’t faced any of the sides in the Champions League before. So that’s exciting. And it’s doubly titillating for Mohamed Elneny and Granit Xhaka who’ll get a Swiss reunion with their old club.
Disappointingly for the Gunners we’ve been denied our annual doubleheaders with Borussia Dortmund (stuck in the same ‘revamped’ pot of seeds) and Olympiakos (too sh*t to qualify). Ah well.
Full Draw
Group A
Paris Saint Germain
Arsenal
FC Basel
FC Ludogorets
Group B
Benfica
Napoli
Dynamo Kiev
Besiktas
Group C
Barcelona
Manchester City
Borussia Moenchengladbach
Celtic
Group D
Bayern Munich
Atletico Madrid
PSV Eindhoven
FC Rostov
Group E
CSKA Moscow
Bayer Leverkusen
Tottnum Twatspur
Monaco
Group F
Real Madrid
Borussia Dortmund
Sporting Lisbon
Legia Warsaw
Group G
Leicester
Porto
Club Brugge
FC Copenhagen
Group H
Juventus
Sevilla
Lyon
Dinamo Zagreb
Couldn’t have asked for better.
I saw our group and my cynical bastard tendencies led to me thinking ‘wow, how will Chelsea manage an even easier group than this’. Hahahhaha
PS My use of easy in no way discounts our ability to shoot ourselves in the tits
Kind draw!! … maybe you will think differently when Arsenal trailing Basel away.
Ok, I’m gonna admit I checked to see who Chelsea had drawn after you said that. Hahahahahahahahaha…
Brilliant 🙂
Could be worse.
Could be Chelsea:P
Tough travel to Bulgaria, but other than that those are nice draws.
Yeah must be all of 3 hours stuck in first class.
Really looking forward to the PSG games, can’t remember the last time we played them
As mentioned in the article, Arsenal have never played against PSG
We have played PSG, just not in the Champions League. We beat them last in the semi-final of the Cup Winners’ Cup in 1994.
Am led to believe the 1st leg was the game where ‘1-0 to the Arsenal’ entrenched itself in our history as a chant – apparently ‘Go West’ was played at half-time in the Paris, for the home supporters to sing along with ‘Allez Paris Saint Germain’. The travelling Gooners then took it as an opportunity to wind them up by reminding them of the score (Wrighty, who else, in the 1st 45 for us)!
Not sure if anyone can verify that, but a good story if true!
Def true me and my husband were in Paris when they played go west at half time
its was sung even louder when alan smith scored that scissors kick in the land of lord bendter!
yeah, i remembered reading in match or shoot magazine that GG passed dixon a tape on ginola and told him to study it and mark him out of the game….
I’m sure I recall Lee Dixon mentioning that it started at an away match in Germany…
Kevin campbell scored and ian got a yellow and missed the final….
They brought a few boys too… Oops!
We played them on route to cup winners cup final when we beat Palma
Parma
*En route
How quickly you forget that scintillating 2-1 victory over PSG in the Emirates Cup. Goals from Flamini and Bendtner, which put us on the way to being inaugural Champions! Brings a tear to my eye.
Sorry, I made an assumption, didn’t remember the tie in the Cup Winner’s Cup. Thumbs down are deserved 🙁
Awesome draw. I am not as pessimistic as the writer, as I believe that this is a winnable group, therefore we would not be playing Barca or Bayern, unless they f*ck it up and finish 2nd in their group.
This kind of thing has already happened. We won our group ~5 seasons ago, got drawn with AC Milan, got tanked 4-0 in the first leg, then 3-0 up at half time in the second leg, but couldn’t find the 4th goal. Classic.
Mexes executed a perfect rugby tackle on RvP in the box late in that first leg too, just to round out Arsenal round of 16 bingo.
This group still has plenty of pitfalls and hurdles. I wouldn’t crown us group winners just yet. Certainly winnable though. COYG!!
Bayern have managed to draw Atléti, so conventional wisdom would dictate that if we somehow manage to top our group, we will draw the second-placed team from theirs.
Nailed on that Ludogorets do us 3-1 at the Ems.
When it comes to Arsenal, kind is relative
Never once been that impressed by PSG. Considering the incredible amounts of money eye lavished on them, they should be winning the CL every season.
If Wenger uses his common sense, wishful thinking I know, we could win this group.
PSG seems maybe a bit diminished this year compared to last year too so that’s nice. To me they’re the 5th best Tier 1 team after Barca/Real/Bayern/Juve so it really could have been worse.
Seems like easy group but we will try our best and make it as hard as possible for us
It’s Called “Arsenaling it”.
Arsenal it meaning:
1. To make simple things as hard as possible.
2. To make rubbish teams look excellent
3. To nearly do it after putting ourselves in a good frame but ultimately fall short.
Nah… be kind to our club mate…. Its actually called A.wengering it! 😉
To Awenger something means:
1. To be a-holistically stubborn about everything
2. To let go players you need go out on loans to make things even more challenging
3. To wind up the team so bad that they are forced to find new and exciting ways to give up the first half lead!
We’ll still come 2nd place and get knocked out in the round of the 16. Qualifying just to get knocked out second round. That’s all that has kept wenger here since 2011.
I don’t know what’s more tedious, going out year after year in the 2nd round, or being reminded about it week after week on here…
It’s the latter mate!
It’s not bad. Could have been worse, but also better. We were a wee bit unlucky in pot 3, i thought. But it’s even-ish.
Decent draw. Surely now we have to be top seed and give a good run in the champions league.
Since when did we become better than PSG?
Let me correct myself, since when was beating PSG a “surely” thing
Since they lost Ibrahimovic and we signed……. Oh wait, you’re right!
Since we signed Xhaka, Holding, Asano, Nwakali, Perez, and Mustafi.
Leicester have a group they can definitely get out of
Kind of rooting for them to go far
Unless they come up against us
Which they won’t because blogs is right about the last 16…..
Que cera…
Does Bernard Lama still play for PSG??
Were it not for the second question mark, this would have been my favourite comment ever
gotta win the group, otherwise you might as well have been in Barca, Real, or Bayern’s group to avoid them in the round of 16
Tottnum Twatspur…….tee hee!
Have to admit, it’s weird seeing Spurs and Leicester in there, with the latter a top-seeded team!
I would have preferred “Twatnum Cuntfucks” but I am slightly drunk.
“Twatnum bollockwanks?” Any good?
I posted the last one after receiving thumbs down for the first but the first seems to be gaining weight! 🙂
Before I go, how about “Totty Shitbusters”?
Goodnight.
So happy. Lifting in Paris, just need to find decent prices tickets!! I am finally going to be able to see Arsenal live again, last time was in 2005 in London 🙂
Looks like Ian Rush had sweaty balls, he had to have someone else handle them. Pleased with the draw, and looking like the Perez deal will go through. He’s not the £60 million striker many wanted, but he has a good skill set which is a good alternative to what Giroud offers. Xhaka looks like a rolls Royce spraying the ball about and Holding looks a fine prospect. Valencia softening on Mustafi and it could finish as a good window. If we keep everyone together and sign Ozil and Alexis on new deals, we should be looking good for a… Read more »
No guarantees. We’ve seen us slip up against Olympiakos and before against Monaco. I think we are still one to two high quality players away to effectively compete against the likes of Bayern, Barca, Real. We may be able to match PSG and Juve this season. City have the tough draw. Hope they get spanked. Leicester and Spurs are more fortunate. We have to not take anything for granted. Those seemingly easy teams have a habit of springing surprises on us. If we reinforce with the Cback and crucially a CF with a bit more guile, we will give ourselves… Read more »
Somebody pinch me !!!
Can’t wait to barely scrape into second place after destroying PSG and Basel twice but losing to FC Ludogorets
🙂 *cries uncontrollablly under blanket*
I can’t seem to find Chelsea or Man U in the draw.
Hope we rest Cech for the first game. Give Ospina a run-out……..
Fuck that. Play our absolute best XI for the first four matches, wrap up first place, then play the U18s in matches 5 and 6.
I was going to make a we’ll lose to Barcelona or Bayern anyway joke but the Newshound beat me to it. *shakes fist at Andrew Allen*
Good draw. I think PSG is exactly the kind of top team that we can beat.
Basel are quite good though so could’ve been better
Dude we beat bayern last year, the problem was losing against Olympiacos and zagreb
We also lost to Bayern
I just looked up the PSG team that played last weekend against FC Metz. Certainly beatable.
Trapp,
Aurier, David Luiz, Kimpembe, Kurzawa
Pastore, Motta, Rabiot
Lucas Moura, Cavani, di Maria
As Wenger pointed out–David Luiz cost a lot more than Holding. Or Ozil.
Plus, David Luiz is a useless wankhammer.
Not again, When will we be drawn against Bayern and Barca in the same group so we can win the Europa league
Probably never, since they will both almost always be in Pot 1, and even if one of them is not, they will anyway be with us in Pot 2.
Anyone know if Ludogrets/Bulgaria has a reputation for racism. I’d like to go but don’t want it be like when I went to the Belgrade game a few years ago!
Hi there – it’s my first time posting here, even though I’ve been reading Arseblog for many years now. I am Bulgarian and I’m very happy that Arsenal will come to Sofia. As for your question – even though Ludogorets is an old club, until recently they were amateurs and don’t really have a large fan base. They are not even from Sofia, where the game will be played (but their stadium does not meet the CL requirements and that’s why they move to Sofia for international matches). So, the stadium will be packed with fans of Arsenal (the biggest… Read more »
I don’t understand why everyone is saying that we will lose to psg both games and we will finish second, bayern last year was in full form and we beat them at the emirates we finished second because of wenger tactics resting the first team against zagreb and losing home to Olymiacpos I hope he learnd his lesson, it could have been goal deference that would decided last year 1st place in the group if we didn’t fucked up the games the we were clear favorites. And I think we are better than PSG, or in pair with them and… Read more »
How will I know it’s approx 9th or 10th December without our final group game against Olympiakos?
That was my feelings exactly against Monaco not until….. well we all know the end of the story. Kindly note that when it comes to Champions League Arsenal don’t have an easy opponent. No champions without crossing the path of Barca,Madrids,Juve or Bayern. If we are going to win the most coveted price then we have to beat at least 2 of those teams. And you don’t beat these teams without balancing your team from defence to attack. I can’t wait to knock those twats out (Tottnum Twatspur)
It’s happened! I’ve been waiting for this tie for years. Finally I can see my team play in Switzerland. Fingers crossed I’ll get tickets…. I’m quite excited right now!
The players can’t afford to have the mentality that this is an “easy group.”
Anything less than our best and we’ll be punished.
Not too bad a draw at all but how f*cking easy is Leicester’s group?!
Well, in the last couple of days Arsenal news have improved a bit, not all is doom and gloom!
I think Basel are probably a stronger team than both Zagreb and olympiacos whom we battled for 2nd place in group last season.
But our quality should see us through comfortably, but this is Arsenal, so expect the unexpected 😉 I predict a by the skin of our teeth advancement to round of 16. Hehe
With our new striker on board, I reckon we’ll win it, and Arsene will retire as a complete fucking legend, all part of his master plan.
Kind? PSG is certainly not kind.
The only positive thing in them bastards’ run in CL is that they’ll have to play on artifical pitch in the bollock-freezing Russian winter…hahh!
Celtic are fucked. No chance getting through thier group. Poor bastards.
They forgot to put manu-united!!