So the big day arrives and Arsenal will find out who our opponents are in the Group stages of the Europa League. The clubs in the pot are spread all over this vast continent and surely our first concern is to get opponents who are not thousands of miles away and could leave us tired for our weekend Premier League matches.
So first off all let’s look at who we cannot draw as they are in Pot One with us….
Sevilla, Chelsea, Zenit, Leverkusen, Dymano Kiev, Besiktas, Salzburg, Lazio, Olympiakos, Villarreal, Anderlecht.
We certainly don’t want Sevilla or Chelsea until we get to the quarter-finals at least!
We will get one of each from the other three pots….
Pot 2
Sporting Lisbon, Ludogorets, Celtic, Copenhagen, Marseille, PAOK Thessaloniki, AC Milan, Racing Genk, Fenerbahçe, Krasnodar, Astana, Rapid Vienna
Pot 3
Betis, Qarabag, BATE Borisov, D Zagreb, Leipzig, Eintracht Frankfurt, Malmo, Spartak Moscow , Standard Liege, Zurich, Bordeaux, Rennes
Pot 4
Apollon Limassol, Rosenborg, Vorskla Poltava, Slavia Prague, Akhisarspor, AEK Larnaca, Jablonec, Spartak Trnava, Videoton, Rangers , Dudelange, Sarpsborg
Personally I would like to have had Celtic AND Rangers, but I don’t think they can have two teams from the same Federation in one Group, so I am going for Genk, who are just over the road in Belgium, and Rangers from Scotland who are hardly the force they were, even with Stevie Gerrard as their new boss.
I have also chosen Malmo, although it may be pretty cold up in Sweden this time of year, they are going to be a very easy team for our reserves to take care of.
Who would be your best trio to face Arsenal?
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