Arsene Wenger identifies ‘advantage’ Arsenal have over PSG ahead of second leg

Arsene Wenger says Arsenal have an ‘advantage’ over Paris Saint-Germain in that they have no ‘mental problem’ to contend with ahead of the Champions League semi-final second leg.

PSG came away from the sides’ first meeting with a 1-0 victory, with Ousmane Dembele scoring the only goal of the game after just four minutes to silence the Emirates crowd.

While the visitors were much the better team, Arsenal did have opportunities to draw level and were twice stopped by Gianluigi Donnarumma, who kept out Gabriel Martinelli and Leandro Trossard either side of half-time.

Bradley Barcola and Goncalo Ramos both spurned chances of their own to increase the deficit in the closing stages, leaving the tie in the balance, as long as the Gunners – who are riding a three-game winless streak – come out fighting in Paris.

PSG were defeated 2-0 by Mikel Arteta’s men in the league phase of this year’s competition back in October, but the French champions were without Dembele that day after Luis Enrique punished the forward for poor timekeeping.

‘Don’t forget that PSG went to Arsenal without Dembele [in the league phase],’ Wenger told beIN SPORTS while previewing Wednesday’s semi-final second leg.

Dembele was punished because he didn’t turn up to a team meeting, came late when they travelled and they pushed Dembele out.

‘When you listen to Luis Enrique, he says that the best decision he made was to punish him that day because he transformed him and he became a different player since then and scored all these goals.

‘Then, I would say Vitinha became the boss in the middle of the park and gave them the stability in possession.

‘You know that Luis Enrique wants to have possession and they transformed their midfield with Joao Neves, Vitinha and Fabian Ruiz. It’s a little bit of a Spanish midfield, playing-wise.

‘They have the better balance now because Nuno Mendes on the one flank and Achraf Hakimi on the other have been exceptional in the Champions League.’

Wenger believes it would be ‘against the DNA’ of PSG to simply protect their lead – and Enrique must be ‘very clear’ with his strategy for the return leg.

‘What is interesting in the Champions League, when you go away and home, is every time before you start the game in the second leg, you have a mental problem to resolve,’ the former Arsenal manager added.

‘The advantage for Arsenal is the mental problem is easy. They have to go and play and win.

‘The mental problem for PSG is: do we play to win this game or do we play to protect our advantage and get them playing on the counter-attack, knowing you have to be very clear in your message to the team.

‘As well, knowing that not everybody in the team will be necessarily aligned with you because if they decide to protect their advantage, it’s a little bit against the DNA of the team.

‘So Luis Enrique has already come out and said they have another game to win and I believe, with the final in mind and you playing at home, it will be very difficult to have a passive attitude.’

PSG are sweating over Dembele’s fitness after the attacker complained of tightness in his right hamstring after finding the net the first leg.

The 2018 World Cup winner played no part in the side’s Ligue 1 defeat at Strasbourg on Saturday and is said to be ‘in a race against time’ to feature versus Arsenal.

According to Stephen Smith, the CEO and founder of Kitman Labs, which specialises in injury welfare and performance analytics in Premier League football, Dembele’s chances of starting are ‘very’ slim.

‘Even if that is a grade 1 hamstring injury, the likelihood of him being able to play within a week is very, very small,’ Smith exclusively told Metro.

‘My gut instinct would be that even if it is a minimal strain you are talking two weeks before you can get him back in.

‘It is an important game too. If you’re not fully confident, can you take a risk with a guy who is not ready and risk damaging that even further and losing him for a longer period of time? It is a really high risk manoeuvre with a player who has been playing so well.

‘I would put it in the unlikely category. If there is even any fibre disruption at all, it is such a high risk decision for a club to make, putting a player out there who could potentially suffer much more significant damage in a really problematic area within the sport.

‘They would want to feel really good about thing before putting him out, regardless of how important the game is.’

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