Fenerbahçe were ultimately banned by UEFA and therefore, thrown out of European competition for two years.

The ban was a result of UEFA finding that Fenerbahçe club officials helped fix matches, which led them to win the 2011 Turkish League title.

Ultimately Pointless?

This would have been good news, had Arsenal lost to Fenerbahçe. But, we ended up suffering losses in the form of Ramsey, Wilshere and Podolski, all of whom were injured toward the end of the second leg. Though the tie may have been pointless, it was not all bad news as we saw Aaron Ramsey shine on a whole new scale throughout the two matches.

Wilshere and Ramsey are thought to be fine, and most likely available for this weekend, however, we suffered a huge loss in Podolski’s injury, a hamstring problem, that will keep him out for at least three weeks.

It is an exceedingly frustrating situation for Wenger, as he had to play an extremely strong team against the Turks in order to secure qualification for the group stages, in addition to needing to please us all as supporters.

He did so, brilliantly, only to get a proverbial slap by UEFA – Good job on your win, Arsène, but we banned them. Good luck with your injuries though! Maybe you should sign someone.

I suppose, however, that I would be praising UEFA had Arsenal lost, so, moving on.

The Group Stages

Due to Arsenal’s performance in the qualifiers, we have been seeded in pot 1 for the group stage draw, which is great news.

We will avoid the likes of Bayern Munich, Real Madrid, Barcelona.

Here is the draw:

We will draw one team from pot 2, one team from pot 3 and one team from pot 4. Teams from the same country cannot face each other in the group stage.

Worst scenario appears to be: Arsenal, PSG, Dortmund, Napoli

Best scenario: Arsenal, Marseille, Basel & Viktoria Plzen

The only teams I would like to avoid: Shakhtar, AC Milan, PSG, Juventus, Dortmund and Galatasaray.

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