Arsenal go to Atletico Madrid on Wednesday for the first leg of their Champions League semi-final, with kick-off scheduled for 20:00 BST and Mikel Arteta saying the night is the chance to make a statement about how far his team has come.
The Arsenal manager said his players have “earned it through incredible work, passion and quality” and added that “now is the moment to make a statement and show how good we are.” He called the tie “a really tough match” and said Atletico’s experience in the competition means they have every right to be in the last four.
Arsenal will be able to call on Eberechi Eze after he went off injured against Newcastle at the weekend, while Riccardo Calafiori and Bukayo Saka are also fit. Kai Havertz and Jurrien Timber are out. Arteta said the squad has shown in Europe “on any ground” what it can do and must play with confidence and the desire to win.
The game carries extra weight because it comes in Madrid, where Arsenal’s task is expected to be very different from the league-phase meeting last season. Arteta said he knows what Atletico have done and what they are capable of, but insisted his team have enough experience now to handle the occasion and adapt to the conditions at the ground in the best possible way. There has also been talk about the surface, adding another layer to a match already shaped by fine margins.
Arteta said he does not take Arsenal’s return to this stage for granted, pointing out that the club went seven years without Champions League football before reaching this point in a remarkably short period of time. He said the side has prepared to win the game and there is no doubt it wants to take a lead back to the Emirates, where the tie will be decided in the return leg.
The only real friction around the build-up came when Diego Simeone said Arsenal are interested in Atletico striker Julian Alvarez, a topic Arteta dismissed in keeping with his line on players who are not his own. For Arsenal, though, the focus is firmly on the first leg, and on whether this team can turn its progress into a result that changes how Europe sees it.
