Women’s Champions League: Barca without key players, Man Utd’s selection gamble

Key Highlights

• Both are still technically in the running for an automatic qualification but require favours elsewhere. Megan Feringa and Laia Cervello Herrero analyse the key talking points from this round of fixtures. Can Arsenal become more ruthless in the final third?Sometimes, it’s more about the destination than the journey.
• That’s especially true when it comes to getting out of the Champions League group stages.
• Arsenal can say, at the very least, they have a play-off spot guaranteed courtesy of a 1-0 win against FC Twente on Tuesday. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThat the reigning European champions would not make it through to the knockout stages risked sounding like the season’s worst hot take.
• But there have been travails on Arsenal’s journey through the group stages: losing to Lyonnes and Bayern Munich, the latter arriving in the middle of two draws in the Women’s Super League.
• But this squad is oozing with quality and eventually quality tells, even if it struggles to assert itself at times. That was the case on Tuesday against Twente: Arsenal comfortably dominant, their press wreaking havoc and wingers Beth Mead and Olivia Smith causing plenty of issues, yet ultimately struggling to make it count beyond Mead’s first-half strike, assisted by Alessia Russo. Twente offered little in response, managing just two shots with one on target.