Arsenal has undoubtedly been a surprise package for this English Premier league with a comfortable among-top-four position on the board for quite some time now and manager Arsene Wenger wants to carry their success onto European turn as well hence is looking for better results over there this year. Accordingly, Frenchman is hopeful for a better show against Barcelona when they would hosts the European powerhouse and Wenger wants to restrict visitors scoring an away goal. This is noteworthy that Emirate side has never been a threatening contender in the knockout stage of UEFA titles, but this year, longest running manager is not willing to live up to the standards and wants to clear round of sixteen for the first time in last five seasons. Although, he accepts they will be against the best forward line of the world comprising trio of Neymar, Messi, and, Suarez, yet, powered by their EPL show, he is confident his players can counter the firing shots of best European forwards.
Actually, it is a strange statement from Wenger since he has ever been a strong believer of attacking football and now when he wants to secure his own goalpost more than bursting the opponents, it means lot more than what he says. Predicting the course of the game tomorrow and if they will successfully manage the visitors, 66-year-old said, “I think we will score tomorrow so I am not too much concerned. But it’s true that recently our goals have dried up a bit and that we have to find a way to get that going again. I am more concerned tomorrow about stopping them from scoring because you can say even at home in the Champions League that 0-0 is not a bad score.
“Recently we always made it difficult for ourselves by conceding goals at home and basically the rules of the modern European Cup encourage you to defend at home and attack away because of the importance of the away goal. Many times I said that should be suppressed because if you concede a goal at home in the Champions League it is a knife in your heart every time. Against big, big teams it becomes very difficult.”
While accepting he is following a different strategy this time, he added, “It’s a bit against my nature (defensive play). I cannot go into a game and think I will just play for a 0-0. I believe you cannot say you are a big club and you just want to defend. On the other hand, Barcelona are a very offensive team. So to give you no chance at all to score against them is guilty as well. You have to try to score against them because if they have a vulnerability like we have it is defensively like with any offensive team.”