For the second time this week, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s timing was a little off.
The Arsenal captain was back in the side against Olympiacos – after being dropped against Tottenham for turning up late – but the Gabon international looked like he was still way off the pace.
Aubameyang endured a miserable night in front of goal, missing several excellent chances to put the game to bed for his side and send them cruising into the Europa League quarter-finals.
Instead they had to endure another nervy evening against the Greek champions in north London as they edged through to the last eight 3-2 on aggregate, despite losing 1-0 on the night.
It’s been just over a year since Olympiacos stunned Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium and sent them crashing out of this competition at the first knockout stage.
Memories of that dramatic evening have been fresh in everyone’s mind since this season’s draw once again paired the two sides together, but Arsenal’s 3-1 win in Greece last week ensured they had far more of a buffer this time around.
And they did need it, with the visitors threatening a comeback when Youssef El-Arabi – scorer of the winning goal last season – gave Olympiacos a 1-0 lead early in the second half.
But that was as good as it got for the visitors, who never really looked like adding to their lead in the closing stages.
The victory over two legs will heal some scars for Arsenal and it ensures they have progressed through to the quarter-finals of the Europa League for the third time in four seasons.
But it wasn’t pretty, with Mikel Arteta’s side once again showing how much they struggle when trying to see a game out.
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And the Gunners boss will know that things must improve if they are going to go on a progress through the latter stages of the competition.
Arsenal lost their way completely in the final 15 minutes against Spurs at the weekend and almost threw away a game they had completely dominated.
Arteta admitted after that game that his side had managed the closing stages ‘really, really badly’ and called on his players to avoid making the same mistakes against Olympiacos.
“We have to do everything different to what we did on Sunday,” he said. “Stop giving simple balls away, stop putting ourselves in trouble and have a clear direction of where we want to have the ball.