Arsenal defender Bacary Sagna believes Mathieu Valbuena will be the biggest threat from French side Marseille tonight as the two prepare to go head-to-head in their first Champions League group game ths season.
The two have been drawn alongside Napoli and Borussia Dortmund and both teams know how important home games will be for qualification, with the French side hosting Arsene Wenger tonight.
The Gunners are familiar with Marseille as they had them in their group two years ago and they managed to pick up a 1-0 win in France after a late Aaron Ramsey goal, and Sagna remembers how dangerous Valbuena can be.
“He is quite difficult to catch,” Sagna told Arsenal Player. “He is really small and moves a lot. He creates a lot of chances so we need to be on form that day and we need to play our way, dictate the game and show we are Arsenal.
“[Marseille’s French internationals] could easily play for Arsenal. I think technically they are at the top and they have a lot of quality and they are used to playing big games. We’ve talked about the game and they are ready to play against us.
“I think we have one of the toughest groups because we have three quality teams to play against.
“We played Napoli in the Emirates Cup and we played Dortmund two years ago in the Champions League which was really difficult and they made the final last year.
“Marseille is probably the best team in France. They have good players, some of them play with the national team and we played them two years ago and it wasn’t easy so we know it’s going to be quite hard.”
Writte by Alex Batt – @AlexBatt
