Champions League
2009-09-16 - R. Standard Liege vs Arsenal
A Sports Betting Pick by Gooner
Football : UEFA : Champions League 2009/10
Wednesday 16th September 2009 - Kickoff 19:45
Standard Liege (Belgium)
Standard Liege come into this match as the Champions of Belgium, but probably owe their place in the group stages as much to the changes that UEFA have made to the qualification process, as to winning the league.
Belgian teams have not distinguished themselves over the last decade at this level, and the Belgian clubs UEFA ratings had dropped to the point where they had to play qualification games in order to reach this point - and in recent years that had been too tough of a task.
Last season Liverpool knocked out Standard Liege in qualification, but by a narrow margin, with the English club needing a very late extra-time goal from Dirk Kuyt to win the second leg, and the overall tie 1-0.
Standard have a good record domestically, as you would expect as champions and are unbeaten in 15 games at home in all competitions, stretching back to December 2008.
Standard Liege Team News :
Liege will have to do without both Steven Defour (foot), Wilfried Dalmat (ankle) with both players being important parts of Liege's midfield engine.
Arsenal (England)
Arsenal's season has already reached it's first "injury crisis" just six games into the new season - and manager Arsene Wenger's instistance that his existing squad was deep enough to compete looks as misguided as it was last season, and the season before that, and the season before that ...
The Gunners started with four straight wins, including home and away against Celtic in this competition, before injuries and team changes, and then a pair of defeats at Manchester United (1-2) and Manchester City (2-4) which has brought the team and the fans back to reality.
The Gunners are still scoring plenty of goals - 18 in those first six games - but the lack of a strong tackling midfielder and some all-around veteran experience sees Arsenal conceding some silly goals - and Arsenal have only kept one clean sheet so far.
Arsenal Team News :
Arsenal have nine players missing for this game, including the first two goalkeepers.
Manuel Almunia (chest infection), Robin van Persie (knee), Denilson (Back), Samir Nasri (broken leg), Theo Walcott (back strain), Łukasz Fabiański (knee), Johan Djourou (knee), Carlos Vela (ankle, foot), Andrei Arshavin (groin)
Head to Head
It's ancient history, but Arsneal and Standard Liege met in European competition in 1993-94, with Arsenal winning 7-0 in Belgium to complete a 10-0 aggregate win.
Arsenal went on to win the European Cup Winners Cup that season with a 1-0 win over Italaian side Parma in the final. A potential good omen?!
But that 7-0 win in Belgium was a freak result at the time - and nothing like that will happen here.
The Betting Verdict :
It's hard to get a good read on Liege, due to their inactivity in European club play, but by looking at the efforts of fellow Belgian clubs Anderlecht and Club Brugge I feel that we can approximate a rating.
Those two sides have given as good as they've got through the 1990's but since 2004-05 Belgian sides have a 4-4-11 record in the Champions League in games I've recorded.
Addtionally, when you filter out the smaller clubs and only take matches against clubs from ranked countries then Belgian clubs have gone 0-1-7 since 2004-05 - usually losing by a 0-1 or 1-2 scoreline.
Arsenal are a little bit patched up, but in Bendtner and Eduardo they still have a quality strike pair and with Cesc Fabragas running the midfield they should get plenty of service.
I'll take Arsenal to win but it might only be by a 1- goal margin.
The Statistics :
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The Pick :
Standard Liege 0-1 Arsenal (or 1-2)
BEST BETTING TIP :
Take ARSENAL to win
