Barcelona's Champions League collapse offers important lessons for Arsene Wenger and his men

When the players take to the field in Moscow on Thursday night, they will do so making sure they will not be the Barcelona to CSKA's Roma

'Last night may be a warning for us. But let us not go overboard as well' (Getty)

For Arsenal, the timing of Barcelona's European collapse could not have been any more helpful. Last night their players watched as Barcelona gave an object lesson in how to throw away a 4-1 first-leg lead. Never knowing whether to attack Roma or contain them, they got caught in the middle and were eventually picked off, losing 3-0 in a raucous Stadio Olimpico, blowing their chance of a Champions League title that could well have been theirs.

Different competition, different context, but Arsenal know they need to learn the same lesson this week. Like Barcelona, they have a 4-1 first-leg lead in their quarter-final. Like Barcelona, they are one of the two best teams left in the last eight and they know their season would be written off as a failure if they go out now. So when the players take to the field in Moscow on Thursday night, they will do so making sure they will not be the Barcelona to CSKA's Roma.

"I think it came with perfect timing," said Shkodran Mustafi, speaking at Arsenal's press conference this evening. "In football you are never safe. Especially when you win at home, and then have the away game. You have to be very careful how you show up. I think the game you saw yesterday was perfect timing for us to show we have to be really focussed and concentrated to finish the job from the first leg."

You could argue that CSKA are not Roma and that their Arena CSKA - holding 30,000 people - is not the Stadio Olimpico. But this is still a team that can hurt Arsenal, as Aleksandr Golovin showed with his first-leg free-kick. Mustafi insisted that they had to be prepared for whatever might happen on Thursday night, as unlikely as it may now seem.

"I thought Roma did a brilliant job," he said. "It was nothing that surprised me. I have been a few years in the professional football, we know this happens often and we have to make sure it doesn’t happen to us tomorrow."

Arsene Wenger only switched over to the Barcelona game once Manchester City were heading out and he revelled in the unpredictability of it. "It can happen in the game, that is why we love football, it is unpredictable," he said. "In every game, everything is questioned again. It is new every time."

The challenge for Arsenal is making sure that they avoid complacency, especially as they have now transferred all of their eggs into the Europa League basket. It was the same with Manchester United last season, when they realised they could not finish in the Premier League top four. These Arsenal players must know the stakes.

Arsenal head into their clash with CSKA Moscow with a 4-1 advantage (AFP/Getty Images)

"I don't think we are under threat of complacency, it is an important target for us to go as far as possible," Wenger said. "Last night may be a warning for us. But let us not go overboard as well. Yes we have a big job to do but we are in a strong position and it is how we approval the game that will be vital tomorrow."

Wenger admitted, in clearer terms than ever before, that this is now his priority. "We are a stage where we focus on this because in the Premier League we have a very, very, very slim chance to move further up," he said. "So the Europa League is one of the big targets now." Which means that doing a Barcelona tomorrow night in Moscow would mark the end of their season.