Declan Rice captured the mood and flagged up the danger signals in his final message as Arsenal gathered in a huddle before they faced the formidable challenge of Paris St-Germain.
“If we don’t have the ball, we die,” Rice told his Arsenal team-mates as they finished their warm-up before the Champions League semi-final first leg at Emirates Stadium.
Arsenal are not quite dead in the tie, but they are definitely struggling to stay alive as they trail 1-0 going into the return in Paris – mainly because they were unable to carry out Rice’s instructions in the crucial opening phases that shaped the game.
The stage was set for Arsenal’s first Champions League semi-final in 16 years by an extravagant display of fireworks and pyrotechnics, all against the backdrop of a huge banner covering the giant stands emblazoned with the words ‘make it happen’.
It was PSG who made it happen – and made it happen exactly in the manner Rice so clearly feared.
Ousmane Dembele’s fourth-minute finish across Arsenal keeper David Raya from Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s delivery was the culmination of a 26-pass move. It was PSG in a microcosm, Rice’s warning delivered in the most painful manner.
To emphasise PSG’s domination in the first exchanges, they had a total of 71.6% possession in the first 26 minutes, the period of the game in which they threw a bucket of ice cold water over what had been a white-hot environment, laying the platform for the advantage they will take back to Paris for next Wednesday’s second leg.
In that same period, PSG had a remarkable passing accuracy of 86.5% in Arsenal’s half, and the total ratio was 165 passes to 60.
In effect, when Arsenal finally read Rice’s memo, the most important damage had been inflicted.
Arsenal pulled it around, having 55.4% possession for the rest of the game, but Rice knew what was coming and PSG were simply too good to stop early on.
