Referee:Alberto Undiano Mallenco
The Gunners trail 1-0 after an embarrassing first-leg defeat in which Lacazette was sent off. Arsenal will be without striker Alexandre Lacazette for the second leg of their Europa League last-32 tie with Bate Borisov.
Top scorer Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang could make his first start in the competition since October. Arsenal fans have called the 17:55 GMT kick-off time “totally unacceptable and inconvenient”.
“Arsenal fans have to travel to the game after work from across London, the south-east and further afield,” said the Arsenal Supporters’ Trust.
“The result will be a huge number of empty seats and many fans having to pay for a ticket on their season tickets which they cannot use. “This is both unfair on Arsenal supporters and will lead to a poor atmosphere in the stadium.”
The game was originally moved to a 17:00 GMT kick-off on Wednesday so as to not clash with Chelsea’s match against Malmo on Thursday but Arsenal lobbied Uefa into a rethink.
Wing-back Ainsley Maitland-Niles missed training on Wednesday because of illness, but midfielder Aaron Ramsey (knee) and defender Sokratis Papastathopoulos (ankle) are back in contention.
Bate on form – the key stats
- Arsenal will host Bate Borisov in European competition for a second time, having beaten them 6-0 in last season’s group stage at the Emirates.
- Including qualifiers, Belarusian sides have lost three of their four previous visits to English clubs in the Europa League; the other was won by Bate Borisov away at Everton in December 2009.
- Arsenal have not failed to score in both legs of a two-legged tie in European competition since the European Supercup final in February 1995, when they followed up a goalless draw at home to Milan with a 0-2 defeat away from home.
- Bate Borisov have won each of their past three Europa League games; they had only won two of their previous 16 in the competition beforehand (D5 L9, excluding qualifiers).
- Igor Stasevich, who assisted Bate’s winning goal in the first leg against Arsenal, has at least three more assists (seven) than any other player in the 2018-19 Europa League.
Source: BBC News
