Arsenal vs Monaco Prediction

Two sides battling to make the UEFA Champions League knockout stage meet on Wednesday. We look ahead to the game with our Arsenal vs Monaco prediction and preview.

Arsenal vs Monaco: The Key Insights

• Arsenal triumphed in a dominant 69.4% of pre-match simulations by the Opta supercomputer.
• Only Barcelona and Bayern Munich (both 7) have won more home games in the Champions League since the start of last season than Arsenal (6).
• Bukayo Saka has been involved in eight goals in his six home games in the competition (5 goals, 3 assists).

Arsenal will look to consolidate their hopes of reaching the Champions League knockout stage when they host Monaco on Wednesday.

Adi Hütter’s side visit the Emirates Stadium sitting level on points with their seventh-placed hosts, who dropped points in the Premier League title race after Sunday’s 1-1 draw with Fulham. William Saliba’s second-half header cancelled out Raúl Jiménez’s opener before Bukayo Saka saw a late winner ruled out for offside at Craven Cottage.

A tough task awaits Monaco given Arsenal’s six wins at home in the competition, since the start of last season can only be bettered by Barcelona and Bayern Munich’s seven. The Gunners’ six clean sheets in that time are also the joint-most with Inter.

On the contrary, no visiting side has kept a clean sheet away at Arsenal in the Champions League since Barcelona’s 2-0 win in February 2016. Mikel Arteta’s men have scored in 11 home games in the competition since then, averaging 2.6 goals per match (29 in total).

Saka has been central to those endeavours, managing eight goal involvements in his six home games in UEFA’s top club competition (five goals, three assists). Saka has also scored and assisted in four separate Champions League games since the start of last season, more than any other player.

Monaco have their own young star, however, with Eliesse Ben Seghir scoring his first Champions League goal last time out in the 3-2 defeat to Benfica. The 19-year-old could become just the second teenager to score in consecutive appearances in the competition for Monaco, after Kylian Mbappé in April 2017 (a run of four).

Hütter’s visitors won 1-0 at Bologna in their last UCL away game, and will be looking to win back-to-back away matches in the competition for the first time since the 2014-15 campaign. Their second such victory came with a 3-1 win at Arsenal, following up a 1-0 triumph at Bayer Leverkusen.

There will be no Arsenal reunion for former academy product Folarin Balogun due to injury, while midfielder Krépin Diatta will also be sidelined for the away side. The pair missed Saturday’s 2-0 victory over Toulouse as Wilfried Singo and Breel Embolo were on target for Monaco, who are third in Ligue 1.

Defensive issues remain for Arteta’s squad as Gabriel Magalhães, Riccardo Calafiori, Oleksandr Zinchenko, Ben White and Takehiro Tomiyasu are all out for this European clash. Thomas Partey may fill in at right-back again, with the versatile Jurriën Timber expected to operate on the other flank.

Arsenal vs Monaco Head-to-Head

Arsenal have met Monaco twice before in the Champions League, with both clashes coming in the last-16 stage of the 2014-15 campaign.

The Ligue 1 side triumphed over the two-legged tie on away goals, with their 3-1 win at the Emirates enough to see them through despite a 2-0 home defeat in the second leg.

Monaco have also won five of their last seven matches against English teams in the Champions League (L2), recording victories against four different sides in this run (Liverpool, Arsenal, Tottenham x2 and Manchester City).

However, this will be their first such clash with an English team since beating Man City 3-1 in March 2017.

Arsenal vs Monaco Prediction

The Opta supercomputer struggled to see past a home win here as Arsenal secured victory in 69.4% of 10,000 pre-match simulations.

Monaco continued their impressive run against English sides with a win in 12.9% of data-led sims, while the draw was ranked more likely at 17.7%.

Arsenal vs Monaco Predicted Lineups

Opta Power Rankings

The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system. They assign an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams. This score is on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.

Ahead of kick-off this week, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.

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