The top two in Champions League group D go head to head on Wednesday night as Arsenal look to book their place in the last 16 of this season’s competition. Both sides were expected to fight it out for 1st and 2nd with games against Anderlecht and Galatasaray being seen as a formality.
Arsenal
Arsene Wenger’s side currently find themselves 2nd and 5 points behind group leaders Dortmund and know a point is required to confirm safe passage out of the group stages. Last time out was nothing short of calamitous as they squandered a 3 goal lead to visitors Anderlecht which saw them drop 2 points to the Belgian outfit.
Arsenal have been struggling in their own league and suffered another loss at the weekend and will be looking to put to rest the memories of their defeat in Dortmund earlier in this season’s campaign as Jurgen Klopp’s men eased to a a 2-0 home win.
Arsenal will be without the fit again Olivier Giroud who is not registered for this season’s Champions League at this stage. Other absentees include Jack Wilshere and Wojciech Szczesny who both picked up injuries at the weekend. Laurent Koscielny, Mathieu Debuchy and Mesut Ozil still remain out of action as there appears to be no end to Arsenal’s injury crisis.
Dortmund
Jurgen Klopp’s side have had a successful Champions League campaign and have sailed through Group D winning their first four games and sit top on 12 points, all this despite their surprisingly awful Bundesliga form where they are down in 16th and have only taken 11 points from their 12 opening league games leaving them a whopping 19 points behind league leaders Bayern Munich.
Dortmund have a few injury concerns for the trip to the Emirates with Marco Reus the latest to be sidelined, Reus was stretchered off with ankle ligament damage and will be missing for upto 2 months. The German is joined by Mats Hummels, Jakub Blaszczykowski, Sven Bender, Nuri Sahin and Sokratis Papastathopoulos who are all set to miss the trip.
Possible teams;
Arsenal:
Martinez, Chambers, Mertesacker, Monreal, Gibbs, Arteta, Ramsey, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Cazorla, Sanchez, Welbeck
Dortmund:
Weidenfeller, Piszczek, Subotic, Ginter, Durm, Gundogan, Kehl, Mkhitaryan, Kagawa, Immobile, Aubameyang
Prediction 2-2
