Wednesday, 31 March 2010, 3:45, Trinidad Time
Location:
Emirates Stadium, London
Capacity: 60,355
Arsenal Football Club (often simply known as Arsenal or The Arsenal, or by their nickname The Gunners) are an English professional football club based in Holloway, North London. They play in the Premier League and are one of the most successful clubs in English football, having won 13 First Division and Premier League titles and 10 FA Cups. They hold the record for the longest uninterrupted period in the English top flight and are the only side to have completed a Premier League season unbeaten.
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In addition to their meetings during the 1999/2000 season, the rival coaches also lined up against each other when Wenger was coach of AS Monaco FC and Guardiola was a player at Barcelona. Guardiola came out on top with Barcelona beating Monaco both home (2-0) and away (1-0) in the 1993/94 UEFA Champions League group stage. Both clubs subsequently lost to AC Milan, Monaco in the semi-final, Barcelona in the final.
Guardiola held aloft the European Champion Clubs' Cup on English soil as a player when the Blaugrana beat UC Sampdoria at Wembley in 1992. But he won only once in five attempts away to English opponents during his playing days.
Henry is Arsenal's record league scorer. He hit 174 goals in 254 Premier League appearances, and 226 in 369 matches overall between 1999 and 2007.
The French international won two league titles and three FA Cups during his time in north London. His first coach when he joined Monaco as a teenager was Wenger.
Fΰbregas travelled in the opposite direction as Henry when he left Barcelona's youth ranks to join Arsenal as a 16-year-old in September 2003.
Thomas Vermaelen was a colleague of Maxwell and Zlatan Ibrahimović at AFC Ajax, playing with the latter from 2001 to 2004 and the former for another two years until 2006.
William Gallas played in the Chelsea team that eliminated Barcelona from the 2004/05 UEFA Champions League but then lost to them at the same last-16 stage the next season.
Mikaλl Silvestre appeared as a last-minute substitute for former club Manchester United in their 2008 semi-final win against Barcelona at Old Trafford.
Andrei Arshavin was in the Russia side beaten 3-0 by Spain in the UEFA EURO 2008 semi-final. Puyol, Xavi Hernαndez and Iniesta were in the Spain lineup along with Fΰbregas.
Gerard Piquι played once against Arsenal during his four years at Manchester United from 2004 to 2008. That appearance against Arsenal in a 2-1 win at Old Trafford in April 2008 was his last in a United shirt.
Seydou Keita scored the opening goal for Sevilla FC when they beat Arsenal 3-1 in the UEFA Champions League group stage in November 2007. Daniel Alves also played for Sevilla that night and the future Barcelona pair were involved too in Sevilla's 3-0 reverse at Arsenal two months earlier.
Carlos Vela is a team-mate of Rafael Mαrquez with Mexico.
The second leg takes place on 6 April. The victors will take on the winner of the quarter-final between FC Internazionale Milano and PFC CSKA Moskva in the semi-finals.
Some players who played for both teams:
Petit, Overmars, Henry, Gio Van bronkhorst and Sylvinho
Previous meetings:
Barcelona came from behind to defeat Arsenal 2-1 in the 2006 UEFA Champions League final at the Stade de France. Samuel Eto'o (76) and substitute Juliano Belletti (81) scored in quick succession to overturn Sol Campbell's 37th-minute opener for an Arsenal side reduced to ten men by goalkeeper Jens Lehmann's 18th-minute dismissal.
