On the cusp of sealing their place in the last 16 of the Champions League, Arsenal's final home match of the league phase sees the Gunners take on Dinamo Zagreb in Wednesday's Emirates encounter.
The Gunners have only been out-performed by Liverpool and Barcelona in this season's league phase so far, while their Croatian visitors sit just inside the unseeded playoff positions and are now under the wing of a World Cup-winning captain.
Match preview
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After Arsenal ended their lengthy exile from Europe's top table, Champions League matches at the Emirates Stadium have provided the Gunners with safe haven, having not been beaten once on home soil in the competition since their Bayern Munich humiliation in 2017.
In fact, the 2-2 draw with the Bavarian giants in last season's quarter-final first leg remains the only time that Arsenal have conceded at home in the Champions League under Mikel Arteta, who has overseen a trio of North London successes with three clean sheets to boot in 2024-25.
The sixth matchday of the league phase saw the Gunners stroll to a 3-0 success over Ligue 1 giants Monaco, leaving them third in the standings on 13 points from a possible 18, although all outcomes are still possible for Arteta's men ahead of the penultimate matchday.
However, victory in midweek could not only guarantee Arsenal a playoff place at the very worst, but also earn them a slice of club history; having also thumped Sporting Lisbon 5-1 before hitting Monaco for three without reply, the hosts could win three successive Champions League/European Cup games by at least three goals for the first time ever.
Gooners may also feel that the UCL represents their side's best chance of silverware after Saturday's disheartening 2-2 draw at home to Aston Villa in the Premier League, where Arteta's men blew a two-goal lead to fall six points behind Liverpool, and it is now just one win in five for the injury-hit hosts.
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While Arsenal's home exploits in Europe's premier competition are to be applauded, Wednesday's visitors Dinamo Zagreb have clinched their only two wins of the league phase so far away from home, seeing off Red Bull Salzburg and Slovan Bratislava after their 9-2 embarrassment at Bayern Munich.
However, home has not been where the heart is for the Croatian giants over the past couple of months, as their 3-0 loss at the hands of Borussia Dortmund preceded a goalless contest with Celtic on December 10, failing to score from 16 attempts across those two showdowns.
Nevertheless, the side now managed by Italy legend Fabio Cannavaro are just about clinging onto the 24th and final knockout spot with eight points to their name, one better off than Paris Saint-Germain and Stuttgart, but they are lacking competitive match practice ahead of the midweek trip to London.
Indeed, Dinamo Zagreb have not yet made their domestic return from their Christmas break and have only taken to the field for a pair of friendly games so far in 2025, securing a 3-1 success away to Polish outfit Lech Poznan before a 1-1 stalemate at Jagiellonia Bialystok.
The side ranked third in the Croatian Football League had gone winless in seven straight games before ending 2024 with a 3-2 success over Varazdin, and both of their previous visits to the Emirates have ended in defeat, including a 3-0 group-stage loss in 2015 where Alexis Sanchez bagged a brace.
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The Arsenal medical team are certainly earning their keep this season, as the Gunners' latest crushing blow comes in the form of William Saliba's hamstring injury, one that will supposedly sideline him for a couple of weeks.
Saliba joins Ben White (knee), Takehiro Tomiyasu (knee), Bukayo Saka (hamstring), Gabriel Jesus (knee) and Ethan Nwaneri (muscle) on Arsenal's absentee list for Wednesday's game, while Riccardo Calafiori faces an uphill struggle to recover from a muscle injury in time.
Arteta responded to Saliba's blow by fielding Jurrien Timber at centre-back and Thomas Partey at right-back against Villa, but the latter was culpable for Ollie Watkins's leveller, so Arteta may now bite the bullet and bring Jakub Kiwior back in from the cold.
Meanwhile, Dinamo Zagreb will seemingly have to work around the absence of experienced striker Bruno Petkovic, who is struggling with an adductor problem and did not feature in either friendly match earlier this month.
Petkovic is currently the only Dinamo Zagreb player in history to score at least four away goals in one edition of a major European tournament - doing so in the 2020-21 Europa League - but teammate Sandro Kulenovic could match that tally with one goal on Wednesday evening.
Highly-rated midfielder Petar Sucic is also missing with an unspecified issue and should not return in time to face the Gunners, but Cannavaro's squad is otherwise in good nick.
Arsenal possible starting lineup:
Raya; Timber, Gabriel, Kiwior, Zinchenko; Odegaard, Jorginho, Rice; Sterling, Havertz, Trossard
Dinamo Zagreb possible starting lineup:
Nevistic; Ristovski, Theophile-Catherine, Mmaee, Pierre-Gabriel; Ademi, Stojkovic; Cordoba, Baturina, Pjaca; Kulenovic
We say: Arsenal 2-0 Dinamo Zagreb
No other team in the Champions League has performed as well at home as Arsenal have since the start of last season, and the Gunners are still yet to concede from open play in the 2024-25 competition.
Arteta's men may be going through a sticky patch at the minute, but they will surely take care of business without a fuss on Wednesday evening, as Cannavaro is subjected to a losing start as Dinamo Zagreb boss.
For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.
Ben Knapton
