I just really want to know what are the "breaking points" of Barca. Where should Arsenal hit in order to win the game(s). We all can simply say "haha what are u talking about, Arsenal should just give up already". No, leave this thread then.

Barca are obviously 90/10 to go through, but as I said what are the keys to beat Barca? Which players should definitely start from Arsenal?

I just think (kinda obvious) that our finishing must be more than on point. Unfortunately we don't have any guys who can bag consistently goals at the moment. I do not rate Barca's defense AT ALL.

Sorry to keep it "from Arsenal's perspective", because there's not too much to speculate from Barca's perspective. They know what to do & have kept doing it the whole season.

And Mertesacker is Arsenal version of Demichelis.. You will always wonder, how these guys get in these teams, why everyone see they are awful.

Suarez should have buried those two chances. Arsenal wasted too many opportunities. 6 years in a row out in the 1/4. I also believe Özil is wasting his time at Arsenal. They need a better striker, Giroud should retire and become an underwear model. Kos is to blame for the 1st goal, what was he doing. Montreal delaying the track back. Too many holes in this team. And before any if you comedians says it I'm aware Inter is not in the cl and we would have done no better. Maybe if we had Özil.

@Wolfie I won't say you are wrong to be honest you are completely spot on, but saying Ozil is wasting his time is kinda too much. Arsenal is a great team and playing under Wenger is a great chance for ANY footballer.

Also I found this a bit fun

@wolfie

No mate , we are not joking about Inter not being in CL . We are laughing at the fact that they are not in even EL .

Ooh wait a second .. we won't be even there either next year ..

If Chelsea had Ozil and also Pogba we would have crucified every team in EPL and boss in Europe again . Assist machine and IMO best playmaker in the world and one of the best CMs .

I actually agree with @Wolfie on that one.

Just watch the highlights again. I still can't understand how Ox missed that. Term was literally sitting down. The only place he could kick it and not score was directly at the keeper. Then he nearly got broken in half by Masch when he took an extra touch. What's the hype, when will Arsene realise this kid will never be good enough. Ibe in Liverpool is even a superior talent. Really feel bad for Özil, he should be in Bayern or City. You could see how frustrated he was. Like what more do you want. Kick the ball off your head when you not looking and into the goal? He Sanchez and Cech are the only players keeping Arsenal from another 4th. I like Wenger as a person but even Henry knew Wenger was over the hill and they would not be in a competitive position with the signings heqas making. A legend that lived and breath for them knew Wenger had list his spark. How long more are the fans going to take this crap for. I'm not even a Arsenal fan but that game had me shouting at the screen. Bellerin also is a good player but makes silly errors. Club hasn't been the same since Viera left. Where is the balls. Too many kids out there. Not going to do anything against Barca with their front 3 without guts and leaders. Too much respec shown. They would have Won that game if they just got their hands dirty. Shame. Who they going to sign in the summer, a 15 year old from Sweden ? CL shortcoming solved AW. They're you go, oh he can't do it. What a surprise. Let's just keep using the same formulae until we find the new Messi. Wenger has done this for so long that I was truly surprised he managed to get Özil and Sanchez. Who would want to play in a team where you have to carry the team on your back and if you don't you get ripped in the media. Even Messi couldn't carry this Arsenal team. It's better balanced than before but a long way from being a dominant team. This is the same problem Inter has been facing. Over reliance on youth with no experiance. They are meant to be in the background developing and leaning. Similar to Arsenal a whole generation retired withing 3 years. 10-13. Totally exposed. May have to reshuffle the deck or drop the weak links quick. Big clubs can't afford to fall short longer than 4 years. I guess our money well run dry even though pre 2005 we went through years of tumble weed. But at least it was enjoyable to watch and we we're competing. These guys are not made of the same material bunch of mamas boys still longinging for the breast milk. Ah, it all a big mess and I'm just getting more and more frustrated. Wenger by some weird alchemy managed to squeeze into cl. So I guess the fans have lowered the standards of what is acceptable because he's the safe choice. Sometimes parting ways is the only way to move forward.

@Wolfie I honestly love that post it sums up all football teams who rely on young talent but doesn't pay off. Sadly football is a money sport nowadays and that is why teams are like that. The young lads are missing the passion and those that they have it are not good enough.

All those described above is from the disease called money, every talented youngster is slowly ignoring his future for a big pile gold.

I remember Wenger and Sir Alex were discussing something on LIVE TV and they said both are afraid of how management of a team is becoming or how will it become in the recent years. Sir Alex saw it and left like a boss, on the other hand Wenger is stubborn and won't change.

Hey if Giroud was any descent he would have scored at least one .. average striker .

Wow. If you watched the match, you'd find that he had 2 chances - 1 header that was perfect which was stopped by fantastic save from Ter Stegen. That was half chance anyways which he managed to do really well. And another one he passed because of miscommunication. And it's suddenly all his fault, right?

Ramsey should have scored 2 blatant MUCH BETTER CHANCES himself & Ox should've scored from 8 yds out while no one around..

Scapegoating Giroud is absolutely embarrassing if there is no reason behind it.

"If" Arsenal were to score from Ramsey's & Ox's CLEAR chances, Barca would have shat their pants because they have no plan B. That's football & almost everyone knew this would happen and Arsenal players can only blame themselves

"If" Arsenal were to score from Ramsey's & Ox's CLEAR chances, Barca would have shat their pants because they have no plan B.

What? Barca are one of the last teams without a plan B. They can play the long-ball, counter-attacking, tiki-taka, attack down the wings, have the center forward play as a poacher, play with one striker, play with three forwards, play with two forwards, high pressure, have their CBs attack.... etc. They literally have more than 10 ways to break down a team. How else do you think they're the best in the world? Enrique is an expert at switching tactics mid-game to give his team the advantage.

If Barcelona were to go down 1-0 or even 2-0, he would've changed the game tactics. It would've, more likely than not, led to Barca coming back for a win or at least a draw. You're underestimating this Barca team because of your bias towards Arsenal. I see this Barca team play literally every other week. I've seen a number of Arsenal games this season. Barring the most miraculous or improbable circumstances and luck, there's no way Arsenal can or could have beaten Barca. They simply don't have the right combination of traits in their players to attack Barca's small lineup.

Arsenal is literally a 'mini' wannabe Barca. Hell, you could argue that Wenger is trying to achieve success the "Barca" way (via slick possession game, small players, promoting/purchasing youth, high CB line, using only offensive-minded wing-backs that are virtually wingers, etc.). You can't beat Barca in their own game. Like @Wolfie said, you've got to get your hands dirty to beat this Barca team.

@Dynastian98 Thank you again for this very good analysis, I sure you realize it but I thought I should tell you, you're an excellent member of the community, keep up the good work. :D

On another note, I think it doesn't really matter what we do say, Arsenal just couldn't beat Barca on that day, they could have done more but sadly, they didn't. This Barcelone team just too tough really.

Excellent argument @Dynas. Well said

there's no way Arsenal can or could have beaten Barca.

IMO, Arsenal could have and should have beaten Barca. You see, we lost 0:2 but before the goal from counter-attack, we were in the game, with a great chances to win the game. We could have beat them, but we did not cause of our finishing.

There's not bias towards Arsenal at all, it's not about that. Barca's performance was far from impressive. 1 counter attack goal because of Arsenal's idiotism and another goal of Flamini's absolutely cancerous brain cramp.

Plan B? No. When I followed Barca in La Liga & UCL closely few years ago, not having plan B was their problem. When that Tiki Taka wasn't working, they were literally shitting their pants. Yes, manager has been changed from that time, but it doesn't matter who manages Barca, it'll always be the same team with same philosophy, with same ideologies etc etc.

I am not here to say that Barca didn't deserve to win, they did. Football is just about momentum & hell of a lot changes when you score a goal. Not saying Barca didn't have chances, they had actually many, that they wasted because of Suarez's or Messi's unselfishness.

No, not happy of Wenger's performance on this occasion, got it almost all wrong.

BTW wtf was Monreal doing in the 1st goal, Wolfie reminded me of it. He had literally ONE job, and that was to block the pass to Messi. I don't know what the f do they teach at Arsenal, but in those situations - goalkeeper takes the player with the ball and defender blocks the pass. I think this is one of the most obvious things ever.

Well, he could have gone alone vs Cech.. It wasn't Monreal mistake, Mertesacker was once again nowhere..

I'm inclined to agree with quik and decent on this one. Saying Barca is simply "too class" for Arsenal takes away the game that actually happened. For periods, Barca looked far superior. And for large portions of time, Arsenal looked for sure like they would score.

The fact that Barca couldn't break down Arsenal's defence was incredible to me. They scored their first goal when both CB's were forward on a set piece and they scored their second due to combined idiotism from Per and Flamini. Those were not classy goals were Barca showed how much better they were. Those are scrappy goals where Barca was 100% dependant on what Arsenal was doing, as opposed to controlling the game themselves.

The reason the game finished the way it did was because Suarez and the entire Arsenal team, Ramsey in particular, couldn't finish some of the most clean chances I've seen all season.

Hey Its an away game, the local team is supposed to get advantage. Any goal a team score is probably a mistake of the other team. It has been the 6th win in a row against an English top side home and away, so if Barça is not impressive yet its not really their problem. They faced a team that is dreaming of this game for month, they secured qualification away in 90 min, the job is done no Matter the performance. I love Enrique's team, we used to dominate and end up eliminated now even in la Liga Barça suffers and get 3 pts...

Any goal a team score is probably a mistake of the other team.

True mate. In that sense that was bit naive comment, but I just thought they were 2 rather major mistakes in this occasion, not just 2 small mistakes :-P

What I meant by "impressive" I talked about how ppl have described me this year's Barca, you'd have expected Barca to do score 10 past Arsenal. Well those are 12-year-old kids anyways. So nevermind that.

And to finish off, yes Barca are the best team in the world atm, no doubt.

We all expect them to score flashy or pes goals, the truth is that they are where they are by hard work and determination, despite Messi only running 8,000 metter on the game Barça run more than Arsenal in average, they did not disrespect them or taking it easy, Mascerano Risks his legs on each game and Alba cant stop running...
Status or money does not win you games, they won what they won because they worked and focused on it on and off the pitch, i admire their intact hunger and sacrifces each year no matter how many things they achieved.
They could have had an off season like any team winning the treble, they dont and if Messi is Saving energy its only for big games and copa America this summer. True champions and it has no relation with money if you want to earn more, City and Psg are the best destinations...

A little romantic here but this team cant stop impressing me since 2005, Iniesta is on his 30´s, Suarez 29, Messi 28, those champions will be clearly missed but they fought to get Neymar and they will surely fight to keep him, Iniesta going to talk to Bellerin after the game is what i like about them, they clearly care for the team, Pique getting booked on purpose after the second goal was not class but definitly useful for the team, Sergi Roberto and Denis Suarez growing... Messi could not be replaced but the direction are doing things perfectly.