Photo courtesy of Arsenal’s official Facebook page
Tomorrow night will bring us the opening match of the Group of Death in this season’s edition of the UCL Group Stage. The teams that will take part are Marseille, and they will be hosting Arsenal. This is going to be a game where both teams will look to be on the front foot for the majority of the time, but only one team is expected to succeed in the majority of the 90 minutes.
Marseille’ most dangerous offensive player is none other than French international attacking midfielder Mathieu Valbuena. He will be responsible for holding possession of the ball near the final third, and distributing as cleanly and precisely as possible. Also, if he finds any open space whatsoever, he will definitely look to rip the ball on frame.
Arsenal will be relying on the same three players that worked extremely hard to bring them three deserved points at Sunderland over the weekend: Mesut Ozil, Aaron Ramsey and Olivier Giroud. These three guys played some beautiful one-touch passing and shooting soccer to bring home the ever-so-important victory — Ozil found Giroud wide open in front of frame, while Ramsey scored a brace to guarantee the win.
Playing in this part of France is never easy for any team, but judging by the soccer that Arsenal have been playing, it is hard to see them earning anything less than three points. They will have to play team defense, team offense and make sure that they find a way to play their game as best as possible.
If they have any slip-ups, they can cost themselves a huge opportunity to earn three points, with teams like Borussia Dortmund and Napoli waiting to pounce on them later on in the group games.
