We look ahead to Tuesday’s Champions League game at Estadio de San Mamés with our Athletic Club vs Arsenal prediction and preview. Will the Gunners start their European campaign in style?
Athletic Club vs Arsenal: The Key Stats
Arsenal are favourites to win the game against Athletic Club according to the Opta supercomputer, which rates their chances of victory at 45.3%.
If Arsenal win this game, they will become the first side in European Cup/UEFA Champions League history to win six consecutive matches against Spanish sides.
Viktor Gyökeres delivered seven goal involvements in eight UEFA Champions League appearances last season.
The UEFA Champions League season opener for Athletic Club and Arsenal pairs one of the tournament favourites against a rank outsider.
If the latter sounds a harsh description for a side that finished fourth in La Liga while also reaching the UEFA Europa League semi-final last season, blame the Opta supercomputer. It simulated the tournament 10,000 times, with Athletic Club going all the way just 0.5% of the time.
It will be in part because they have the joint-eighth hardest set of fixtures based on the average Opta Power Rating of their opponents via the Opta Power Rankings. As Arsenal are facing the second-easiest octet of games by this measure, it’s clear why they are second favourites to win the 2025-26 Champions League behind only Liverpool.
But whatever the standard of opposition, the Gunners have a formidable recent record at this stage of the competition. Across the last two editions of the Champions League, only Real Madrid (33) accumulated more points in the group/league phase.
They won 10 and lost just two of their 14 fixtures. Indeed, their only defeats in the competition at any point last season came against the eventual finalists, with two losses to Paris Saint-Germain and one to Internazionale.
An enormous part of their relative success has been their solid defence. Arsenal have conceded just 18 goals in 24 Champions League matches under Mikel Arteta, a mere 0.75 per game. This impressive record will be harder to maintain on Tuesday if William Saliba is unable to return to action., though.
It seems unlikely Martin Ødegaard will feature after he went off injured on Saturday in the 3-0 win over Nottingham Forest. Christian Nørgaard is nearing a return but Kai Havertz, Gabriel Jesus and Bukayo Saka will not feature in Spain.
Arsenal’s defensive record in this competition is up there with the very best ever seen. Among teams with 20+ matches under a manager, only four sides in the competition have a better goals-conceded-per-game average: Fabio Capello’s Milan (0.38), Louis van Gaal’s Ajax (0.63), Frank Rijkaard’s Barcelona (0.68) and Ernesto Valverde’s Barcelona (0.71).
The latter is now in charge of Athletic Club. Like Arteta, Valverde has several injuries hampering his squad. Iñigo Lekue looks closest to resuming first team action but it looks unlikely that star winger Nico Williams will be involved. Unai Egiluz and Yeray Álvarez are longer term absentees.
After starting the La Liga season with three wins in succession versus Sevilla, Rayo Vallecano and Real Betis, Athletic Club suffered a surprise 1-0 home defeat to Alavés on Saturday courtesy of an Alex Berenguer own goal just shy of the hour mark at Estadio de San Mamés.
Aided by managing a Barcelona side that won two La Liga titles on his watch, Valverde has only lost nine of his 42 games as a manager in the Champions League (winning 23). Among Spanish managers with 10+ matches in the competition, only Pep Guardiola has a lower loss rate (17.1%) than Valverde (21.4%).
He managed Athletic Club in their previous campaign at this level, back in 2014-15. They have won six of their seven European matches played at San Mamés since Valverde returned in 2022. However, the exception was a defeat to Manchester United which does not bode well when Arsenal are so much better.
The Gunners can also call upon a forward with an excellent recent record in Europe. Viktor Gyökeres was directly involved in seven goals in eight appearances in the Champions League last season (with six goals and one assist for Sporting CP). He averaged a goal or assist every 87 minutes played; only Saka (95) had a minutes-per-goal-involvement ratio under 100 in the competition in 2024-25.
If the visitors win this game, they will become the first side in European Cup/Champions League history to win six consecutive matches against Spanish sides. In the last two seasons Arsenal have beaten Real Madrid, Sevilla (both twice) and Girona. They have an excellent chance of adding Athletic Club to this impressive list.
Athletic Club vs Arsenal Head-to-Head
This will be the first competitive meeting between Athletic Club and Arsenal, and just the third time the La Liga side have faced an English opponent in the European Cup/UEFA Champions League. They were eliminated by Manchester United at the quarter-final stage in 1956-57 and by Liverpool one round earlier in 1983-84.
However, Arsenal won 3-0 when the clubs met in the Emirates Cup Final at the Emirates Stadium last month. Viktor Gyökeres scored first for the Gunners in the 34th minute, before Bukayo Saka and Kai Havertz also found the net.
The Gunners have won their previous three matches in Spain too. They beat Girona and Real Madrid last season and Sevilla in 2023-24, all by 2-1 score lines.
Athletic Club vs Arsenal Prediction
This is predicted to be one of the closest Champions League ties this week.
An Arsenal victory was deemed the most likely outcome by the Opta supercomputer, as they won in 45.3% of the simulations.
It’s obviously therefore likelier that the Gunners don’t win. The remaining percentage points were split almost evenly, with 28.2% for an Athletic Club victory and 26.5% for a draw.
Athletic Club vs Arsenal Prediction
Athletic Club vs Arsenal Predicted Lineups
Athletic Club: Unai Simón, Jesús Areso, Dani Vivian, Aitor Paredes, Yuri Berchiche, Íñigo Ruíz de Galarreta, Mikel Jauregizar, Iñaki Williams, Oihan Sancet, Alex Berenguer, Gorka Guruzeta.
Head Coach: Ernesto Valverde
Arsenal: David Raya, Jurriën Timber, Cristhian Mosquera, Gabriel Magalhães, Riccardo Calafiori, Mikel Merino, Martín Zubimendi, Declan Rice, Noni Madueke, Eberechi Eze, Viktor Gyökeres.
Head Coach: Mikel Arteta
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system. They assign an ability score to over 10,000 domestic football teams. This score is on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
Ahead of kick-off on Tuesday in Spain, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.
UEFA Champions League Stats Opta
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