On the cusp of reaching back-to-back Champions League semi-finals for the first time ever, Arsenal take on Sporting Lisbon at the Emirates Stadium on Wednesday, in the second leg of their quarter-final encounter.<\/p>\n
Mikel Arteta’s men left it late to snatch a 1-0 win<\/strong> at the Estadio Jose Alvalade last week, but the domestic cracks have continued to widen for the jaded hosts.<\/p>\n Visiting a venue where they had found the back of the net five times in the 2024-25 league phase, Arsenal likely would have settled for a grand total of zero goals in the first leg against Sporting, who found no way past the impenetrable wall that was David Raya.<\/p>\n However, super subs Gabriel Martinelli and Kai Havertz combined for a last-gasp winner on Portuguese turf, meaning that it is firmly advantage Arsenal as the Gunners endeavour to set up a semi-final tie with Atletico Madrid or Barcelona – most likely the former.<\/p>\n By avoiding defeat to their Primeira Liga foes in midweek, Arsenal would have made the UCL semis in successive seasons for the first time in their illustrious history, and the Gunners have won 17 of their last 18 continental two-legged ties when claiming a first-leg victory on the road.<\/p>\n The hosts also boast an eight-game unbeaten home run against Portuguese teams in Europe – winning six and drawing two of those contests, excluding penalty shootouts – but the Emirates walls came crumbling down at the weekend.<\/p>\n Indeed, Bournemouth’s merited 2-1 Premier League victory<\/strong> allowed Manchester City to cut the gap at the top down to six points with a game in hand, and in the eyes of many, the outcome of this weekend’s Etihad extravaganza could determine the fate of the title.<\/p>\n Suffering as many defeats in their last four games as they had in their first 49 matches of the season (three), the famed Arsenal ‘bottle’ is showing signs of rearing its ugly head again, but progression to the UCL semis – however ugly it may be – could have untold psychological benefits before Sunday’s season-defining showdown.<\/p>\n \u00a9 Imago \/ Ball Raw Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n While Arsenal are the Porto of the Premier League at the time of writing, Sporting are the Man City of the Primeira Liga, as Rui Borges’s men kept the Dragons honest with their third straight league victory at the weekend.<\/p>\n Daniel Braganca’s fifth league goal of the season was enough to propel Sporting to a 1-0 triumph over Estrela Amadora, keeping the Green-Whites five points adrift of Porto – who have played a game more – in the Primeira Liga standings<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The Portuguese top-flight title is out of the visitors’ hands, though, and they also may have one eye on their own heavyweight battle with Benfica on Sunday, but not before a shot at club history.<\/p>\n Sporting have never won a two-legged European contest after losing the first leg by a one-goal margin at home, and they have lost 13 of their last 14 such ties following a first-leg home loss by any scoreline, only prevailing against Brondby in the 2010-11 Europa League playoffs (2-0 home defeat, 3-0 away win).<\/p>\n Still, Sporting should smell blood against a waning Arsenal side on Wednesday – especially given how they put Raya through his paces in Portugal – and few Gunners fans will need reminding of the visitors’ penalty-shootout triumph in the 2022-23 Europa League last 16, when Kim Kardashian was bizarrely in attendance to witness Arsenal’s downfall.<\/p>\n Arsenal Champions League form:<\/p>\n Arsenal form (all competitions):<\/p>\n Sporting Lisbon Champions League form:<\/p>\n Sporting Lisbon form (all competitions):<\/p>\n \u00a9 Iconsport \/ SPI<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n While Piero Hincapie and Eberechi Eze are back up and running sooner than expected, Arsenal’s cause in recent weeks has not been helped by the absences of Martin Odegaard, Riccardo Calafiori, Bukayo Saka and Jurrien Timber, all of whom are touch and go for the second leg.<\/p>\n Mikel Merino (foot) is Arsenal’s only guaranteed absentee at present, but fellow midfielder Martin Zubimendi looked spent in the defeat to Bournemouth, so it would not be a shock to see Christian Norgaard deployed at the base of the engine room.<\/p>\n Both Norgaard and Zubimendi will miss the first leg of any potential semi-final if they are yellow-carded on Wednesday, but that risk gives Arteta another incentive to spare the Spaniard.<\/p>\n Elsewhere, Havertz and Martinelli could not replicate their midweek heroics from the first whistle at the weekend, so a fit-again Eze and Leandro Trossard should be recalled to the XI.<\/p>\n From Arsenal midfielders to Sporting midfielders, Borges will welcome a key fixture back to the XI in Morten Hjulmand, who was suspended for the first leg due to an accumulation of bookings.<\/p>\n The visitors are without two fringe attackers in Fotis Ioannidis (ligament) and ex-West Ham United winger Luis Guilherme (ankle) but are otherwise in good shape for the second leg, which Luis Suarez is available for despite some first-leg confusion.<\/p>\n The 33-goal striker was initially thought to have collected a suspension-inducing yellow card last Tuesday, but it turned out to be an administrative error, so he is fine to lead the line in North London.<\/p>\n Arsenal possible starting lineup:<\/strong><\/p>\n Raya; White, Saliba, Gabriel, Hincapie; Norgaard, Rice; Madueke, Eze, Trossard; Gyokeres<\/p>\n Sporting Lisbon possible starting lineup:<\/strong><\/p>\n Silva; Fresneda, Diomande, Inacio, Araujo; Braganca, Hjulmand; Catamo, Trincao, Goncalves; Suarez<\/p>\n \n
Arsenal and creativity have not gone hand-in-hand at the minute, and the Gunners’ defensive steel has also abandoned them, thanks in no small part to their fitness concerns at full-back.<\/p>\n However, with Sporting needing to go for broke to keep the tie alive, space will open up for the hosts to exploit, and they may just need the one, scrappy goal to seal their semi-final spot.<\/p>\n For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.<\/p>\n On the cusp of reaching back-to-back Champions League semi-finals for the first time ever, Arsenal<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2462,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nMatch preview<\/h2>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.sportsmole.co.uk\/thumbor\/ebyMvoYRxUexvA7lSo-LRKRMV00=\/640x480\/smart\/filters:format(webp)\/https%3A%2F%2Fsportsmole-media-prod.s3.gra.io.cloud.ovh.net%2Fuploads%2F2026%2F01%2Ffotojet-2026-01-31t124520-097-697debb46b3ad476510460.jpg\"\/)
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\nTeam News<\/h2>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.sportsmole.co.uk\/thumbor\/7NjH4vRlzaXz0OPRRn7X20VlrjQ=\/640x480\/smart\/filters:format(webp)\/https%3A%2F%2Fsportsmole-media-prod.s3.gra.io.cloud.ovh.net%2Fuploads%2F2026%2F02%2Ficonsport-360150-0236-1-1-69a150151e65c667604508.jpg\"\/)
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\n![](\"https:\/\/www.sportsmole.co.uk\/thumbor\/aAWazEIN-TXYyGNUOzzmBClUe-g=\/210x53\/smart\/filters:format(webp)\/https%3A%2F%2Fsportsmole-media-prod.s3.gra.io.cloud.ovh.net%2F20%2F33%2Fsm-words-green-background.png\"\/)
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nWe say: Arsenal 1-1 Sporting Lisbon (Arsenal win 2-1 on aggregate)<\/h2>\n
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