Arsenal leave Greece with a clean sheet and an all-important away goal.
Looking at the team line up before kick-off there was a feeling that the team was unbalanced and that proved to be the case in a frustrating first half.
There were rather a few negatives on display, Lacazette missing some great opportunities, Willock looked lost, Aubameyang and Martinelli wasted on the flanks, again, no creativity from the midfield, zero transition play and the defence looking shaky.
Olympiacos should have been at least one up within two minutes, if not two, but in all fairness, Arsenal did have their fair share of chances as well. But the whole lack of creativity was overwhelming in the first 45 minutes.
For some weird reason the Greek side had it in for Matteo Guendouzi, they targeted him throughout, maybe they had the mistaken belief that he was the creative spark within the team.
Sokratis, I think, was playing at right-back and he is simply not suited there and Olympiacos looked to take advantage time and again.
Overall, the first half was a bit flat but Arsenal are a team of two halves and so hopefully, Arteta will send them out in much better shape than they started the game.
The second half, for the most part, was as bad as the first. Arsenal was lacklustre and as in the first 45 minutes offered very little in terms of creativity.
Lacazette was, well.. Lacazette, and there were continued shaky moments in defence. At times Arsenal struggled to do anything with the ball and they were lucky that Olympiacos has zero intelligence when they were in the ascendency.
Leno kept the score at 0-0 and without him, it would have been a very different story.
The game swung in Arsenal’s favour in the 81st minute when Lacazette tapped the ball into an open net.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang fed Bukayo Saka who put a pinpoint pass into Lacazette who simply could not miss. It was a decent team goal.
At the end of the day, it was a win, an away goal and a clean sheet and that is all that matters. It may not have been the best performance but the result is what counts.