A night under the lights to save our Champions League season against the German champions and recent history tormentors. What more could you ask for on a random Tuesday in October?

It wasn’t meant to be this way. We were supposed to have collected six points and be looking like a draw in one of these two games would look like a decent enough result, but our own kamikaze approach to two eminantly winnable games in this competition, have led us to the precipice of Champions League failure. If tonight goes wrong and we are defeated to Lewandowski et al, I think that’s probably all she wrote, with not even Angela Lansbury able to get us out of this cock up.

But do you know what? I’m ok with us going out. Call it Champions League malaise if you will, but the perpetual defeatings at around of 16 or quarter final stage have lost their appeal. Perhaps Arsenal are trying something new. Perhaps Arsenal are going for collapse at a European level of epic proportions. Hey, we keep telling ourselves that it might not be so bad to have a good run in the league, look what Liverpool did a few years ago…

Yet for all of that posturising, for all of the talk of domestic glory at the expense of European football, I’ll bet you are just like me. You want to see this Arsenal team step up and prove themselves at a European level by going toe-to-toe with Pep’s Bayern and coming out on top.

Come on, admit it, a glorious night under the lights at the Emirates would go down a treat wouldn’t it?

Think about what it would do for morale. Victory against ze Germans and another win to add to this season’s tally and form. Another win with a few goals from our big names sets us up brilliantly for Everton under the lights again on Saturday early evening. Another win and another grand performance fromMesut and Alexis to stick two fingers up to the “doesn’t do it in big games” brigade. Oh yes, I’d love to be there tonight to see it.

I wonder what the atmosphere will be like? Will the fans be making enough noise to spur the team on? I hope so. It’s a big game and we’re in a privileged enough position that these games have become the norm for us, so I hope there’s plenty of us in the ground shouting our hearts out, I certainly will be.

Despite hinting at the weekend that there might be a bit of rotation for the game, Arsène confirmed in his pre-game presser, that all are fit (barring the usual absentees at the moment) and we will see a similar team to the one that played on Saturday against Watford. That works for me. We are still relatively new in to the season and the players should be fresh enough to handle the Watford, Munich and Everton game in eight days. Thankfully the game against Watford was done and dusted earlier in the second half, which meant the players could go a little easier and if Alexis is his usual effervescent self against Bayern this evening, then we know we have a chance of winning. 

Will Arsène take the chance to rotate Theo and Giroud? The latter may have scored, but the former will relish the opportunity for more space on home turf. Bayern won’t sit ten bodies deep on the edge of their own box and for that reason Theo may have a little more joy than he did against the Hornets.

Other than that, I see the same side lining up, so I don’t think there’s much need in running through a one to 11.

Bayern’s team we know well enough. They will favour a possession-based game with rapid counter attack from the new boy Douglas Costa and Benatia supporting goal machine Lewandowski. It’s not the most familiar of line ups to me, but they still have Müller and his time machined 70s socks to contend with.

Bayern are basically one of three teams likely to win this competition, with Madrid and Barca being the others, so like it or not we’ve got to do the improbable to stay in the competition. I personally can’t see it, but I still have my hope, because that’s what being a football fan is all about.

Come on Arsenal, if we’re going to go out of Europe, let’s do it swinging like a slightly over-the-hill Hollywood boxing story. I’ll be there tonight and I’ll be with you until the last.