Arsenal vs Valencia
Arsenal will host Valencia at the Emirates Stadium in the first leg of the Europa League semifinal round. Arsenal need to maximize their role as hosts for capital to penetrate the final round.
Arsenal are required to be able to maximize the match at the Emirates Stadium in this first leg. The reason is that Arsenal have a poor record when playing at home to opponents who have suffered 9 defeats and have only been able to win 4 wins in their last 16 away games in all competitions.
Two of the nine defeats they have recently felt over Leicester City (0-3) and Wolverhampton (1-3). These results make Arsenal always lose in their last 3 games which previously also had been humiliated by Crystal Palace at the Emirates Stadium with a score of 2-3. Therefore, Arsenal need to try to achieve a convincing victory at the Emirates in the first leg.
In addition to minus self-confidence, Arsenal are also being afflicted with severe injury problems. Mesut Ozil and Nacho Monreal are still in doubt and are likely to miss this match. While Aaron Ramsey, Danny Welbeck, Denis Suarez, Hector Bellerin and Rob Holding are certain to miss due to injury.
Meanwhile, Valencia itself is also not without problems. Valencia is in a bad form, always losing in its last two matches. Marcelino foster children in a row were defeated by Atletico Madrid 2-3 and the guest Eibar 0-1 in La Liga. They are still stuck outside the big four. This forced Valencia to share their focus between the League and Europa League.
Valencia will also lose some of their flagship players in this fight. Although not as severe as experienced by Arsenal, losing Geoffrey Kondogbia, Denis Cheryshev and Cristiano Piccini will clearly have a bad influence on Valencia’s preparations ahead of this important match.
The conditions of both teams were equally unfortunate ahead of this fight. Especially for Arsenal, which was hit by a storm of severe injury. However, playing at home will provide more motivation for Unai Emery’s forces to achieve the best results in this first leg.
Our Prediction: 1
Odds: 2.08