On 10 April 2011, Jens Lehmann was brought on as an emergency substitute against Blackpool after Manuel Almunia was injured in the warmup.
Lehmann played for Arsenal between 2003 – 2008, making 199 appearances and keeping a total of 80 cleans sheets.
In 2011, the German was set to return to north London for six weeks in order to earn his coaching badges. The Gunners just so happened to be going through a bit of an injury crisis at the time when it came to goalkeepers. In fact, Manuel Almunia was Arsenal’s only fit senior shot-stopper. Wojciech Szczęsny, Łukasz Fabiański and Vito Mannone were all sidelined.
Lehmann therefore agreed to come out of retirement in order to be an emergency back-up keeper just in case Almunia got injured.
The German was on the bench for a match against West Brom and later appeared for Arsenal’s reserves against Wigan, which the Gunners lost 2-1.
On 10 April, Almunia got injured in his warmup ahead of Arsenal’s Premier League match against Blackpool and Lehmann had to stand in.
It was his 200th Arsenal performance and although he didn’t manage to keep a clean sheet, the Gunners still won 3-1 with goals from Abou Diaby, Emmanuel Eboue and Robin van Persie.