Last season we topped the League format of the Champions League with eight wins out of eight. That included a rather impressive home win against tonight’s opponents, Bayern Munich, as Timber, Noni and Gabby Martinelli scored the goals in a dominant display in which the numbers showed we were by far the better team. This season is the reversal of the fixture, and I’m going to go as far as to say this is the most difficult game – barring the final last year – that we’ve had since we were knocked out by PSG two seasons ago.
Last season our away games were Athletic Bilbao, Club Brugge, Slavia Prague and Inter Milan, and Inter were hardly any great shakes. This season we come up against a Bayern team who I think are going to cause us a lot more problems. So this becomes a really interesting test of this Arsenal teams’ credentials in this competition.If we progress out of this group stage, and if we do it as a team finishing in top eight, it’s unlikely we’ll meet Bayern again until probably the quarter final, but I expect them to go deep in this competition, so the likelihood is that if we keep progressing, we will see them again. So tonight becomes somewhat of a tester for us against one of the big clubs, and arguably one of the best four teams in Europe, if the bookies’ data is to be believed.
I think that’s probably right. Bayern sit top of the Bundesliga, as usual, and will inevitably go on to win their domestic league. They are undefeated all season, have already beaten what looks like their closest rivals, Dortmund, in the German Supercup, they smashed Leipzig 6-1 at the weekend and are looking their usual imperious selves. They have a Harry Kane who has bagged nine goals in 10 games already, and given his history with us, will fancy getting his customary penalty, which he always seems to get when playing The Arsenal. They are a formidable opponent and we should be rightly wary.
But they are not infallible. Their last outing saw them draw 3-3 with Norwegian side Viking (Harry Kane getting another penalty – warming himself up for us, obviously), with Olise sent off, which means he won’t be available tonight. He’s one of their key attacking cogs, and when you also factor in that they also don’t have Musiala due to his longer-term injury, that’s two very key attacking options they are without. So we have some hope that we could get at them, and this could be better than pretty much every memory I have of playing Bayern Munich as an adult. Even the 2-0 win we got back in 2013 ultimately didn’t mean anything, se we’d lost the first leg at home and then ultimately went out on goal difference. So as a 43-year-old Arsenal fam, I can’t really remember a time away from home that we’ve enjoyed ourselves at the Allianz.
To be fair, few teams do, because the perennial German Champions are constantly stocked with the best players in their league. They have players who come through their youth ranks who are also the best in Germany too, like Lennart Karl, who scored against us last season and I thought looked like a really good talent.
We’ve got our own too, however, and in abundance, so the question for most of us this morning is how Arteta deploys his. He confirmed that Zubimendi is back in the team, and Hincapie is a ‘maybe’, but I think he won’t be risked, and we’ll see him against Everton on Saturday. He was asked a lot of questions about Arsenal’s style of play, brought about by more media comments again as they try to find something to poke at The Arsenal with. I [covered this with some thoughts yesterday](https://www.suburbangooners.com/2026/10/20/think-of-the-premier-league/), so I won’t go over it again. But we all know that we won’t see a low block at Bayern, so I hope the team takes the opportunity to show what they are capable of in an attacking sense.
And with that in mind, I’m really intrigued as to what Arteta goes for tonight. If you’d have asked me two weeks ago, I’d have told you the front three would be easy: Saka, Havertz and Eze. Those are the three best technical players we have at the moment; they are the ones who play the best football and give us the best chance of a goal. But Havertz’s display at the weekend has me questioning, as does Eze’s, and conversely, I thought both Gyokeres and Madueke did well, so I don’t think either could be ruled out. I think Arteta probably does go with Havertz in Germany, because he’ll be super up for this one in his home country, but with Bayern sure to leave more space in behind, a channel runner like Big Vik could be an option. On the left, I think it is more likely we’ll see Noni. His impact on Sunday, plus the way Arteta purred about him afterwards, has me leaning towards an inclusion for Noni, so my gut feel on tonight’s side is:
Raya
Timber – Konsa – Gabriel – Calafiori
Bruno
Odegaard – Rice
Saka – Havertz – Madueke
I toyed with the notion that Arteta would go for Myles either at left back or in midfield, but I suspect he might just stick with the more experienced midfield for now, plus the ‘X-factor’ nature of Calafiori popping up in those pockets in attacking spaces. But if MLS is preferred in any position at left back or central midfield, he’s in such form that I’m not going to complain.
We’re going to have to do a fair bit more defending tonight than we did on Sunday, we certainly aren’t going to have as much of the ball, but we will get more space to play our football. This is not terminal if we lose, a draw would be fine, a win would be amazing, but getting all three points would also be a big statement for the rest of Europe. It would show that this Arsenal team are geared up to go deep in this competition. So I’m excited to see how we get on.
Catch you all tomorrow.