Arsenal vs Barcelona: Arsene Wenger torn in two directions facing Barca challenge

Arsenal manager knows the importance of a clean sheet in home legs but admits he is tempted to attack the holders

Wenger prepares for the match against Barcelona during Arsenal training on Monday (EPA)

“If you concede a goal at home in the Champions League,” Arsène Wenger said yesterday, “it is a knife in your heart every time.” The Arsenal manager knows the feeling too well. His team have been eliminated from the first knockout round for the last five consecutive seasons, three of those after losing the first leg at home, all to teams less good than the one they will face tonight.

This is the hardest balance in football, knowing how to prepare for a Champions League first leg at home. Tonight Arsenal must solve it, against the best team of their generation. Wenger’s nature, his squad, and his pride in being a big club all tell him to attack, because, as he said, being “audacious” is “what you will need to be against Barcelona”.

On the other hand, there is the simple fact that Barcelona are probably the best attacking team of all time, with the three best forwards in the world all playing together.

Not only will stopping them be very difficult indeed, it will also be absolutely necessary. The away goals rule, which Wenger opposes, means that Arsenal will almost end their chances of progress if they concede more than one tonight.

In each of the last three seasons Arsenal have eliminated themselves by losing badly at home at this stage: 3-1 to Bayern Munich in 2013, 2-0 to the same opponents in 2014, and, most traumatically of all, 3-1 to Monaco this time last year. And Barcelona are a very different proposition from those sides. So how do Arsenal approach the game?

“I think we will score tomorrow so I am not too concerned about that,” Wenger said. “But I am more concerned tomorrow about stopping them from scoring. Because you can say even at home in the Champions League that 0-0 is not a bad score. Recently we made it always difficult for ourselves by conceding goals at home.

“The rules of the modern European Cup encourage you to defend at home and attack away because of the importance of the away goal. Many times I said that should be suppressed, because if you concede a goal at home in the Champions League it’s a knife in your heart every time. Against big, big teams it becomes very difficult.”

There might be a case for digging in, parking the bus, hoping for a 0-0 and then playing the same way at the Nou Camp in pursuit of an away goal. In the absence of an obvious way to defeat Barcelona, that plan would be as good as any. But Wenger said that his own record and values, as well as the self-esteem of his club, would not allow him to do that.

“It’s a bit against my nature,” Wenger admitted. “I cannot go into a game and think I will just play for a 0-0. You cannot say you are a big club and you just want to defend. On the other hand, Barcelona is a very offensive team. To give yourself no chance at all to score against them is guilty as well. You have to try to score against them because if they have a vulnerability, like we have, it is defensively like with any offensive team.”

Arsenal would be better equipped to play that way tonight than they have been in recent years. Part of Arsenal’s recent improvement has been their defensive stabilisation, their ability to win games without the ball, most memorably at Manchester City last season and against Bayern Munich in October.

“We defend better,” Wenger said. “We can defend when it is needed. Football is simple. It is about, at that level, quality and experience. For a number of years we had players of 20, 21, 22. You become a top-level player between 23 and 30. It is as simple as that. Today we could do that better because our young players have more experience.”