The season has well and truly begun as Arsenal’s Champions League journey starts with a familiar opponent, Borussia Dortmund. They don’t come much harder as Dortmund are seen as Arsenal’s main opponents for top spot in a group that could provide a few surprises.

Here we go again

In recent times, Arsenal and Borussia Dortmund have something of a rivalry in Europe’s biggest competition as they have been pitted together in the same group on three occasions in the past four years.

Arsenal are certainly familiar with the German team and will look to do a repeat of last year’s result when they picked up all three points at the Signal Iduna Park courtesy of an Aaron Ramsey header.

Team news

Arsenal will look to gain confidence in their attacking prowess in the 2-2 draw against Manchester City but their defence is a cause for worry. Mathieu Debuchy will be unavailable because of an injury picked up that could see him out for 3 months.

Calum Chambers has tonsillitis so he will be assessed before the game. If Chambers comes up short, Hector Bellerin could be called up for a surprise start against the former German champions. Nacho Monreal has not travelled with the group to Germany because of a back problem so Kieran Gibbs will look to start.

Yaya Sanogo has also stayed at home with a hamstring problem so Danny Welbeck will look to continue as striker and hope to score his first goal for Arsenal.

Toughest challenge first

With Dortmund being Arsenal’s biggest worry, Arsenal will have to overcome their biggest challenge in the group at the first hurdle.

Although Arsenal have a bit of a defensive crisis with not enough depth at the back and with strikers Olivier Giroud and Theo Walcott still out of action, Dortmund have their own injury crisis with a number of first team stars out of action such as Marco Reus, Ilkay Gundogan, Nuri Sahin and Jakub Blaszczykowski.

It should be a tightly contested match with both teams playing attacking & attractive football. Predicting a thrilling, fast paced game ending in a draw.

Expected team line-up

Wojciech Szczesny, Calum Chambers, Per Mertesacker, Laurent Koscielny, Kieran Gibbs, Mikel Arteta, Jack Wilshere, Alexis Sanchez, Mesut Ozil, Aaron Ramsey, Danny Welbeck.

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