(Football news) Galeno’s incredible last-minute goal proved to be the difference between Mikel Arteta’s team and defeat as they were about to salvage a respectable goalless draw from the first meeting.
Preceding their first leg of their last-16 matchup with Porto, who had shipped five goals to Barcelona in their final Champions League group game, the Gunners had taken Burnley to six goals and hit West Ham United for six. It seemed impossible to stop the goal-scoring Arsenal juggernaut.
Sergio Conceicao’s team, however, took advantage of extraordinary circumstances when Galeno’s long-range curler nestled into the bottom corner. This was because Arteta’s team gave in to multiple soft and needless fouls, as well as a lack of preparation right before the end.
An uncharacteristically toothless Arsenal departed the Estadio do Dragao without managing a single shot on target – not since 2011 had they achieved that unwanted feat in the Champions League – but Arteta has got the response he was looking for from his troops, who woke up on Sunday sitting pretty at the top of the Premier League table.
Three successive wins over Newcastle United, Sheffield United and Brentford – the latter thanks to an 86th-minute Kai Havertz header – saw Arsenal reclaim their perch for the first time since December, and Liverpool’s 1-1 draw with Manchester City means that the Gunners are still looking down on the other 19 teams with 10 games remaining.
In between watching the mouthwatering Anfield battle with his feet up, Arteta seeks the winning formula which will prevent Arsenal suffering an eighth successive Champions League exit at the last-16 stage, and the Spaniard witnessed his side win all three of their group games with 12 goals scored and zero conceded during the autumn.
Arsenal has only advanced in the Champions League after losing the first leg once in their previous ten attempts, and that victory, fittingly, occurred against Porto in the 2009–10 season. That is still the most recent time the Gunners have advanced to the quarterfinals of Europe’s premier competition.
In an effort to prevent history from happening again in North London, the Portuguese superpowers travel there on the strength of a series of encouraging home victories, which included an incredible 5-0 annihilation of the league’s top team, Benfica, on March 3.
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