Danny and Nicky Cowley, who led Lincoln City to an FA Cup quarter-final with Arsenal, laughed whilst recalling watching the Gunners face Bayern Munich earlier that week.

The Cowley brothers were set to face Arsenal at the Emirates, but earlier in the week the Gunners had Bayern in the second-leg of their Champions League tie. Wenger’s side were already 5-1 down from the away match, but initially rallied well to score in the first-half, before a red card saw them completely collapse in the second for another 5-1 defeat.

Danny Cowley laughed as he told FourFourTwo: “Bayern had stayed there on the Wednesday before their Champions League game. We always watch videos of the opposition’s recent matches, so we were sat there watching Arsenal play against Bayern Munich. That was certainly different!”

But after Arsenal inflicted a similar defeat on Lincoln City, Danny Cowley says he was impressed by Arsène Wenger’s treatment of the pair, despite his tough week. He explained: “He’d had a really tough time. They had just lost heavily to Bayern and he’d been getting pelters from the media.

“Given the week he’d had, he was brilliant with us. He was really honest and open. He was telling us how much he loved technical players – he actually said that was probably his weakness.”

The Arsenal match must have been comical, for a neutral, given how the contest was built up, only to become a one-sided embarrassment. After the red card, it was simply a case of watching to see how many Bayern could score. Granit Xhaka being moved to centre-back must’ve been particularly funny.

It wasn’t such a great experience as an Arsenal fan, and beating Lincoln City so convincingly later in the week didn’t really make it any better.

Unfortunately, that sort of roller coaster week is just how football at the Emirates is these days.