Lucky Arsenal Limp Into Last Eight

Arsenal fans must have lifted a shot or 10 of vodka in thanks to Spartak Moscow last night. Despite a poor performance and a deserved defeat here, Spartak's 1-1 draw at home to Lyon means Arsene Wenger's team have reached the quarter-finals of the Champions League for the first time. The phrase lucky Arsenal springs to mind.

Wenger will mind little about that, of course. After an anxious four-minute wait by the side of pitch for news of the score from Russia he clenched his fists, clapped his hands and began to look forward to tomorrow's draw in Nyon, which will pair Arsenal with a Spanish side. "The four minutes felt like 90 minutes," he reflected.

Either Real Madrid, Valencia or Deportivo la Coruna lie in wait next month over two legs for Arsenal, who will have to improve on this to go further. England now have three representatives in the last eight and the beer cellars of Munich must have been awash with celebrations last night given that Bayern's win guaranteed their progress as group winners. They should have won more comfortably.

"We weren't the real Arsenal," Wenger reflected, knowing his side had not played like a team who needed a win to be certain of going through. "We missed a spark. We never changed our pace and never looked like creating chances. We missed our communication and passing in the team.

"I'm happy we're through to the quarter-finals but we depended more on Spartak Moscow's performance than our own. When you depend on a result of another team you can always say you are lucky. But if we are in the last eight we must have some qualities."

Those were not too much in evidence here. Only David Seaman's goalkeeping and some poor Bayern finishing kept the score down and Arsenal, despite plenty of possession, managed only one shot on target and failed to force the Bayern goalkeeper Oliver Kahn into a serious save.

Bayern admittedly made life difficult by pulling men behind the ball and defending with discipline after Giovane Elber had scored in the 10th minute, knowing a draw would suffice to take them into the quarter-finals. But the lack of creativity in Arsenal's performance was worrying. "Was it too much pressure or fatigue?" Wenger wondered. Ultimately it did not matter.

Despite managing only two victories in the second group stage, each 1-0, over Lyon and Spartak Moscow, Arsenal have made it through. They do so with fewer points than any of the other qualifiers and somewhat unconvincingly but join Leeds and Manchester United with pride.

Their success means the Premiership and Spain's Liga hold six of the last eight places and a shift in the balance of power of European football is apparent. For the first time since 1982 there is not an Italian club in the last eight of the premier club competition.

"Maybe English football is not as negative as you tend to think in your country," Wenger said. "It shows English football has made a huge step forward in the last three years. When I arrived you had only Manchester United.

"There's a chance now for every club to go through. It's not every year you have a Champions League without Lazio, Milan and Barcelona."

Wenger knows what to expect from whoever Arsenal draw next, particularly Deportivo, whom Arsenal beat 6-3 on aggregate in last season's Uefa Cup. "Three great sides," he said. "Real Madrid have the maybe the most flamboyance but technically all three are very good."

From the moment Elber put Bayern ahead early on it seemed Arsenal would have to rely on a favor from Spartak and there may be a few shirts with Dmitri Parfenov's name on the back spotted soon around Highbury. His fourth-minute penalty gave Spartak the lead and Sonny Anderson's equalizer was too little.

Arsenal could hardly have got off to a worse start. Gilles Grimandi had already been saved the embarrassment of a own goal by David Seaman's reflexes when Bayern took a 10th-minute lead through Elber, who had made it clear before the game that he had no respect for Arsenal.

The Brazilian certainly took his goal smartly, meeting a cross by the impressive Bixente Lizarazu with a diving header after Thorsten Fink had picked out the Frenchman with a delicious pass made with the outside of his right boot.

Bayern twice more went close before the interval and Arsenal, despite periods of possession, still found Bayern hard to break down. And with Mehmet Scholl, the attacking Germany midfielder, a constant menace behind the front two Arsenal were frequently carved open in the second half.

Carsten Jancker should have scored from a Scholl cross, Lizarazu went close and Scholl himself forced one sharp save out of Seaman. Even when the news from Moscow came through, Wenger said, the dressing-room was not dancing with delight.

"It was very quiet," Wenger said, "because the first thing you need to be very happy is a good performance and we didn't feel we gave that tonight." No matter, with more than a little help from Spartak, Arsenal are through to the next round.

Bayern Munich (3-4-1-2): Kahn; Kuffour, Andersson, Linke, Salihamidzic, Fink, Jeremies, Lizarazu; Scholl (Wiesinger, 90min); Jancker, Elber (Tarnat, 90).

Arsenal (4-4-2): Seaman; Dixon, Adams, Grimandi, Cole; Pires (Silvinho, 76), Lauren, Vieira, Ljungberg (Parlour, 61); Kanu (Wiltord, 61), Henry.

Referee: A Frisk (Sweden).

P W D L F A Pts

Bayern Mun 6 4 1 1 8 5 13

Arsenal 6 2 2 2 6 8 8

Lyon 6 2 2 2 8 4 8

Sp Moscow 6 1 1 4 5 10 4

Quarter-final qualifiers

Winners

Real Madrid

Deportivo la Coruna

Valencia

Bayern Munich

Runners-up

Leeds United

Galatasaray

Manchester United

Arsenal