Arsenal face Atletico Madrid in Spain on Thursday, in arguably the biggest game of the season for Arsene Wenger’s side.

Overview

Last week, Arsenal couldn’t take advantage of their extra man at home, and ended up with a disappointing 1-1 draw. It means Atletico have the advantage going into the match, as they only need the game to remain scoreless and they’ll be through to the final.

On the other hand, if Arsenal get a single goal, the game swings back in their favour. At that point any draw or win would be enough to at least force extra time, if not qualify in 90 minutes.

The task is therefore simple: Score. It’s better to concede one and score one than doing neither; Arsenal can’t afford to sit back and hope for a goal.

So how will the manager set up his side for the weekend, to try and ensure victory (or a high scoring draw) against one of the toughest defensive opponents in Europe?

Let’s try and work it out…

Next: Team news, line-up and final XI

Team news and predicted line-up

The big news is that Henrikh Mkhitaryan, David Ospina and Alex Iwobi are all back from injury in time for the match. They all picked up knocks against Manchester United over the weekend, but returned to training on Wednesday in time for the game.

Alexandre Lacazette, Aaron Ramsey, Mesut Özil, Jack Wilshere, Laurent Koscielny and Shkodran Mustafi all missed out completely over the weekend. It therefore seems pretty likely we’ll see the six of them return to the starting line-up after their rests.

There were some hoping that after Konstantinos Mavropanos’ fantastic debut on Sunday, he might get a chance at the back. I can’t see it happening though, the match is too important for Wenger to gamble.

Nacho Monreal dropped to the bench for Manchester United, with Sead Kolasinac taking his place. Kolasinac is also back in training after the knock he picked up that game, but Monreal will probably start over him on Thursday.

Granit Xhaka and Hector Bellerin played the full 90 minutes at Old Trafford, but I don’t think that will stop them playing another on Thursday. The pair are too irreplaceable in the current side. Plus Mohamed Elneny is still a strong doubt for the match anyway.

Danny Welbeck started last week, and came off the bench at the weekend. However, Mkhitaryan’s return will probably see the Englishman drop to the bench.

David Ospina should play in goal, but it’s become a near impossible task to guess the goalkeeper in recent weeks. They’re each playing both competitions almost as often as each other.

Next: Final XI

Final XI