THE LOWDOWN
Arsenal play Benfica at Meadow Park on matchday three in the Champions League league phase on Wednesday night at 8pm. The Gunners essentially threw away two points last time out in this competition when they capitulated and tossed away a 2-0 lead in the last few minutes against Paris FC.
It has to be one of the club’s most traumatic Champions League nights, with Renee Slegers not taking her post-match press conference because she was too angry. While that episode is at an end now, it still means that the Gunners have no room for error against Benfica, especially as their next assignment involves a trip to the Camp Nou to face defending champions Barcelona followed by a game at home to Lyon.
Victory in Saturday’s North London derby represented ‘a good first step’ according to Renee Slegers in her post-match press conference. It wasn’t the most fluent or aesthetically pleasing victory but Arsenal dug in and got a deserved 2-1 win. But it has to be a building block after a terrible start to the campaign.
This game comes around quickly and Slegers said on Saturday that that represented a good situation for her team so they can build momentum and rhythm. Last time out at Meadow Park Arsenal absolutely squeaked past HB Koge with a stoppage time penalty. The three points are the most important but, on this occasion, it feels like we now need to see an authoritative performance too.
TEAM NEWS
Mariona (hamstring), Frida Maanum (quad), Chloe Kelly (hamstring). Selina Cerci (knee), Katie Reid (knee) and Michelle Agyemang (knee) are all out for this game. Kim Little returns after illness and a small muscle injury.
Available squad
Goalkeepers: 1.van Domselaar 16.Misa 28.Borbe 40.Damm
Defenders: 2.Fox 3.Wubben-Moy 5.De Almeida 6.Williamson 7.Catley 22.O.Batlle 24.Hinds 31.Holmberg
Midfielders: 4.Stanway 10.Little 14.Reuteler 32.Cooney-Cross
Forwards: 9.Foord 11.Smith 19.Baum 23.Russo 25.Blackstenius
Unavailable: 8.Mariona 12.L.Maanum 17.Agyemang 18.Kelly 26.Reid 29.Cerci
A WORD FROM THE BOSS
‘The way we play with intensity, with fight and with a grittiness that is necessary in a North London Derby, that’s for us the foundation in the performances going forward as well. There are some really good things, but now we have to back it up and the next one’s tomorrow. We’re very excited for the Champions League game tomorrow- excited to be back close with the fans at Meadow Park and play under the lights and know what it means for the players to play in Champions League.
‘There is some similarities we expect. I think the amount of duelling in the North London Derby, the physicality on the pitch, the intensity that was necessary in the battle on the pitch. We expect the same tomorrow. They’re a very robust team with a good organisation, good structures and they fight and so in that sense, we expect to face something similar. The good thing is that we did that well in the game and the weekend. We want to go to the next level with it.
‘The foundation for us and the win was the intensity that we brought to the game, us as a collective attacking, defending together, the fights, the grittiness, the resilience, because also they scored their first goal in the game. We had to come back from it, so those things are important for us and we definitely want to bring that to tomorrow night’s game as well.’
LAST TIME OUT
The teams met in the league phase of last year’s Champions League in Lisbon, Arsenal ran out 2-0 winners thanks to goals from Beth Mead and Alessia Russo.
THE OPPOSITION
Benfica were formed in 2017 and have won every league title since they arrived in the Portuguese top flight in 2019 (though the 2019-20 season was cancelled with no winner due to Covid-19). They have dominated Portuguese women’s football ever since, even winning a domestic quadruple in 2023-24. They got to the Champions League quarter-finals that season before losing to Lyon.
Their current squad, coached by Ivan Baptista, has a few names some Arsenal fans may well recognise. Danish striker Caroline Moller played for Inter Milan and Real Madrid, 36-year-old defender Ana Borges played for Chelsea and lost to Arsenal in the FA Cup Final at Wembley in 2016. Forward Diana Silva had a season at Aston Villa in 2020-21. It’s also the club that Arsenal signed Canadian winger Cloe Lacasse from in 2023.
Benfica are used to dominating games and scoring plenty of goals in their domestic league. In Europe, they are savvy enough to ‘switch modes’ and play more of a counterattacking game when required. They are an intense team generally and will look to go ‘player for player’ in their pressing approach.
PLAYER TO WATCH
Taylor Hinds made her first WSL start of the season against Spurs on Saturday and played excellently. Her manager Renee Slegers purred about her performance in the aftermath too. ‘She’s come back really well after the international window. And like I said before the game, she deserves to play today because of her performances in training. ‘
Also, of course, she gives us a left foot on the left side, but she was so good. So I’m so happy for her, like the team, for her as well, to go through a bit more difficult time individually and then coming and playing a North London derby with such conviction and so much mobility.’
Really, it ought to be enough for her to keep her place at left-back. Benfica are also a player-to-player marking team, even if they probably won’t press quite as intently as Spurs, they will still press. Part of the calculus of playing Hinds was to have players on their natural sides so they weren’t spending time getting the ball onto their strong foot under intense pressure.
MY PREDICTED LINE-UP
Subs: 1.van Domselaar 3.Wubben-Moy 6.Williamson 10.Little 14.Reuteler 19.Baum 22.O.Batlle 28.Borbe 31.Holmberg
HOW TO CATCH THE GAME
The game takes place at Meadow Park at 8pm on Wednesday evening and will be shown live on Disney + in the UK. Full global listings are available here.
COMING UP
We will post the team line-ups around an hour before kickoff and have Aidan Gibson’s on the whistle match report. Every word of Renee Slegers’ post-match press conference will go online around 60-90 minutes after full-time. Then the weekly Arsenal Women Newsletter piece will be published on Thursday. You can sign up to the newsletter for free here.