{"id":529696,"date":"2026-03-17T23:48:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T23:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/529696\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T23:48:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T23:48:08","slug":"arsenal-2-0-leverkusen-mar-17-2026-game-analysis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/529696\/","title":{"rendered":"Arsenal 2-0 Leverkusen (Mar 17, 2026) Game Analysis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eberechi Eze<\/a> scored a stunning first Champions League goal as Arsenal<\/a> beat Bayer Leverkusen<\/a> 2-0 on Tuesday at the Emirates to march into the quarterfinals.<\/p>\n

Eze opened his European account with a spectacular 20-yard thunderbolt before Declan Rice<\/a> added a classy second to seal a 3-1 aggregate success.<\/p>\n

Arsenal had found Leverkusen tricky opponents in Germany<\/a> last week, needing a last-gasp Kai Havertz<\/a> penalty to snatch a 1-1 draw.<\/p>\n

But they were totally dominant and there was nothing “ugly” or “boring” about this win for the critics to moan about, either.<\/p>\n

Mikel Arteta’s side swaggered their way into the last eight for the third successive year and, with Sporting Lisbon the opposition, they will fancy their chances of reaching another semi-final at least.<\/p>\n

Moreover, with a nine-point lead in the Premier League<\/a>, a Carabao Cup<\/a> final meeting with Manchester City<\/a> on Sunday and an FA Cup quarterfinal at Championship Southampton to come, an unprecedented quadruple is edging tantalisingly closer as the weeks go by.<\/p>\n

With 16-year-old Dowman among the substitutes again, Leandro Trossard<\/a> was back in the starting lineup after a hip injury.<\/p>\n

\"ArsenalArsenal players celebrate after scoring a goal against Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League.<\/p>\n

The Belgian had the Gunners’ first real chance after he was teed up by Bukayo Saka<\/a> 20 yards out, curling his shot towards the top corner and forcing a flying save from Janis Blaswich<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Moments later, a Saka corner found the familiar head of Gabriel Magalh\u00e3es<\/a>, but the defender nodded the ball just over the crossbar.<\/p>\n

Blaswich had to parry a free-kick from Rice and an angled drive from Saka, before the busy Leverkusen goalkeeper made a superb reflex save from Trossard.<\/p>\n

When Saka took another corner short, Blaswich kept out Trossard’s shot and then denied Ben White<\/a> from the rebound.<\/p>\n

The dam finally burst 10 minutes before half-time, and it was well worth the wait.<\/p>\n

Eze, on the edge of the box, took one touch with his left foot to control Trossard’s pass, swivelled and launched a rocket with his right past Blaswich and into the top corner.<\/p>\n

After the break Piero Hincapi\u00e9<\/a>\u00a0— against the club from whom he is still on loan — and Viktor Gy\u00f6keres<\/a> went close to doubling the lead.<\/p>\n

However, it was Rice who put the tie to bed just after the hour mark, latching on to a weak clearance, striding forward and stroking the ball home from the edge of the area.<\/p>\n

Even when Leverkusen threatened late on, David Raya<\/a> pulled off a fine save to deny Christian Kofane<\/a> a consolation as the Gunners completed a statement win.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eberechi Eze scored a stunning first Champions League goal as Arsenal beat Bayer Leverkusen 2-0 on Tuesday at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":401620,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[403,99],"class_list":["post-529696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529696\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/401620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}