I still haven't gotten over what happened yesterday, so I'll split everything I have to say in sections.
Starting line-ups
I don't know much about Bayern, but I did notice Rafinha, Shaquiri and Muller were left out. Shaquiri is injured, but Rafinha was benched in favour of Lahm, who played much of the season as a DM. Seems Guardiola smelled the potential weakness of Rafinha at right-back and ploughed for Lahm. When Cazorla was taken off, Rafinha made his entrance.
Arsene gave a surprise start to Sanogo. The lad played the entire game and played well enough, but his attacking actions were restricted, apart from a burst of activity early on.
Ozil and penalty
Bar a 3rd minute shot (well-saved by Szczesny), we've managed to put pressure on Bayern and created a couple of dangerous moments. Sanogo saw his effort blocked and then a pass from Wilshere split open the Germans defence. Ozil got the better of whoever it was, then was knocked down. The ref pointed to the spot, Mesut stepped up and did the exact same thing he did earlier in the season. A short run, a weak shot, a save, this time from Neuer.
This is getting ridiculous. After the first miss, Ozil would have been the last man to take the spot-kick, if it was up for me to decide. I'm sure Wilshere would have had better luck. Maybe even Cazorla. It's high time we reconsider our pecking order.
Szczesny and a red card
After the penalty miss, Arsenal lost a bit of pace going forward and Bayern started to get back into the game. This resulted in a couple moments of danger, but we've dealt with these well enough.
Up until 37th minute. A lob pass split open our defence, Robben got a foot to the ball, sent it out for a goal kick, then bumped into Szczesny, performed a theatrical dive and went down like he's been shot. The ref bought it, pointed to the spot and sent Szczesny off.
This decision killed the game. Apart from the fact, that such double punishment is harsh (overly harsh, in my opinion) it made an interesting game boring as hell. By virtues of justice Alaba hasn't scored, but Arsenal were forced on the back foot for the remainder of the game. It was getting hard to fend off Bayern with 11 men, but having ten made it nigh on impossible. We held out till the break with the scores level, though.
Second half
It was boring. We got as many men behind the ball as humanly possible and tried with all our might to keep the German side at bay. They did manage to score on the 54th minute, but it was down to a brilliant piece of play, rather than poor defending.
Second goal
We then kept the score at 1-0 till the 88th minute. And just when it looked like we'll only have one goal to chase in Munich, some poor decision-making from us ensured we'll have to score at least twice at Allianz Arena.
Arsenal have won a free kick upfield and instead of playing it short or just lumping the ball towards Sanogo, we've brought Koscielny into the box. He got to the ball, lost it and Bayern flew forward. They've been waiting for an opportunity such as this all night and the fact we have given it ourselves is frustrating in the extreme.
Koscielny got stuck high up the pitch, Flamini didn't cover his position well enough, Muller got in-between the Frenchman and Mert and scored. The fact, that this was an entirely avoidable goal made it that much harder to swallow.
Conclusion
So, what do we do now? The same thing we always do after a defeat. Put the maximum effort into winning our next game. And when the time comes, we send our best squad to Germany and go for it. Like last year.
And I'll get back to you later. Tomorrow, maybe. Cause right now, it's still hard to gather my thoughts.
Starting line-ups
I don't know much about Bayern, but I did notice Rafinha, Shaquiri and Muller were left out. Shaquiri is injured, but Rafinha was benched in favour of Lahm, who played much of the season as a DM. Seems Guardiola smelled the potential weakness of Rafinha at right-back and ploughed for Lahm. When Cazorla was taken off, Rafinha made his entrance.
Arsene gave a surprise start to Sanogo. The lad played the entire game and played well enough, but his attacking actions were restricted, apart from a burst of activity early on.
Ozil and penalty
Bar a 3rd minute shot (well-saved by Szczesny), we've managed to put pressure on Bayern and created a couple of dangerous moments. Sanogo saw his effort blocked and then a pass from Wilshere split open the Germans defence. Ozil got the better of whoever it was, then was knocked down. The ref pointed to the spot, Mesut stepped up and did the exact same thing he did earlier in the season. A short run, a weak shot, a save, this time from Neuer.
This is getting ridiculous. After the first miss, Ozil would have been the last man to take the spot-kick, if it was up for me to decide. I'm sure Wilshere would have had better luck. Maybe even Cazorla. It's high time we reconsider our pecking order.
Szczesny and a red card
After the penalty miss, Arsenal lost a bit of pace going forward and Bayern started to get back into the game. This resulted in a couple moments of danger, but we've dealt with these well enough.
Up until 37th minute. A lob pass split open our defence, Robben got a foot to the ball, sent it out for a goal kick, then bumped into Szczesny, performed a theatrical dive and went down like he's been shot. The ref bought it, pointed to the spot and sent Szczesny off.
This decision killed the game. Apart from the fact, that such double punishment is harsh (overly harsh, in my opinion) it made an interesting game boring as hell. By virtues of justice Alaba hasn't scored, but Arsenal were forced on the back foot for the remainder of the game. It was getting hard to fend off Bayern with 11 men, but having ten made it nigh on impossible. We held out till the break with the scores level, though.
Second half
It was boring. We got as many men behind the ball as humanly possible and tried with all our might to keep the German side at bay. They did manage to score on the 54th minute, but it was down to a brilliant piece of play, rather than poor defending.
Second goal
We then kept the score at 1-0 till the 88th minute. And just when it looked like we'll only have one goal to chase in Munich, some poor decision-making from us ensured we'll have to score at least twice at Allianz Arena.
Arsenal have won a free kick upfield and instead of playing it short or just lumping the ball towards Sanogo, we've brought Koscielny into the box. He got to the ball, lost it and Bayern flew forward. They've been waiting for an opportunity such as this all night and the fact we have given it ourselves is frustrating in the extreme.
Koscielny got stuck high up the pitch, Flamini didn't cover his position well enough, Muller got in-between the Frenchman and Mert and scored. The fact, that this was an entirely avoidable goal made it that much harder to swallow.
Conclusion
So, what do we do now? The same thing we always do after a defeat. Put the maximum effort into winning our next game. And when the time comes, we send our best squad to Germany and go for it. Like last year.
And I'll get back to you later. Tomorrow, maybe. Cause right now, it's still hard to gather my thoughts.