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Arsenal will be hoping not to wind up as the third Premier League club to be knocked out of the Champions League by Paris Saint-Germain after Liverpool and Aston Villa.
But as David Raya claimed, PSG are a top team and they have shown this season that after years of underwhelming in Europe, they finally look prepared to win the Champions League this campaign.
Aside from their one-goal lead as well, the advantage that Luis Enrique’s side have is that they are much more experienced in Europe’s elite competition in comparison to Arsenal in recent seasons.
Arsenal’s big-hitters did not turn up against PSG and at the Parc des Princes, that cannot afford to be the case.
Summer signings like Mikel Merino, Riccardo Calafiori and Raheem Sterling will be hoping to give their side the much-needed boost they need both on and off the pitch to help them change their fortunes in Europe.
Mikel Merino says Arsenal will beat PSG in the Champions League semi-final second leg
Out of the three, Merino is expected to start for Arsenal against PSG.
Whether Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta chooses to stick with Mikel Merino in midfield or surprise PSG’s defence by deploying him up front remains to be seen.
After Tuesday’s contest, the £27.4 million man (Sky Sports) revealed via HaytersTV that the Gunners’ latest performance showed they can go toe-to-toe with Luis Enrique and Co: “Why am I optimistic? Okay, based on what I have seen tonight, I think you have seen a team that can compete against a huge side like Paris.”
“I don’t know if you saw Paris in the whole season but they are a really dominant team, they want to keep everybody on their own box and we managed to play a lot, we created big chances.”
“This team, you never can give up on us because I think we proved that we always going to fight until the end so I think we have the technical quality and most important we have the motivation to go to the second leg and win this for our fans and for ourselves.”
Merino was adamant that the result does not change much and went as far as to predict Arsenal to beat PSG and go through to the Champions League final: “I think it changes nothing because the mentality of this team is always going to win, even if you are three up or one down so we are going to Paris with the mentality of sticking to our basics, sticking to our standards and try to win.”
“I think we saw a team that can compete against anybody, we had massive chances to level the game, we couldn’t, but the team is full of confidence and full of energy for the second leg.”
Merino added: “Yeah, those experiences [winning at the Santiago Bernabeu] are massive for us to prove we can win anywhere, the Bernabeu, against any side in the Premier League as well, it gives us a lot of confidence. Paris is a tough place to go but still have proved always that we can compete against anybody and with all due respect to anybody, I think we are going to win the second leg.”
Luis Enrique revealed Arsenal’s chances of a comeback vs PSG
Arsenal fans will be buoyed by Merino’s mindset ahead of the second leg against PSG.
However, Luis Enrique, who called Arsenal “dangerous” agrees that they could very well stage a comeback at the Parc des Princes.
Enrique said: “But our objective and there’s only one of them is that to win the second leg at home as well.”
“And with Arsenal, we cannot let our guard down, we cannot be complacent. This is a team that can completely rewrite history in a second, they can score a goal quickly and we’d be back to square one.”
Whether Merino’s statement could hand Arsenal a psychological edge in the French capital will be intriguing to observe.
