Giroud’s Champions League hat trick puts Arsenal in final 16

Giroud’s hat trick kept Arsenal’s streak of reaching the knockout stage alive, with the Premier League side winning 3-0 in Greece to progress as the second-place team from Group F behind Bayern Munich.

HAVE TO BE FOCUSED Ozil said: “We have to be focused on the game, we have to give a really good performance”.

Dinamo was defeated 3-0.

The Gunners took their time as they felt their way into the contest but finally stirred as Joel Campbell’s cutback was struck goalwards by Mathieu Flamini, with a deflection off Manuel da Costa taking the ball onto the crossbar.

Brown Ideye, who spent last season at West Bromwich Albion, will come back into the attack after being rested at the weekend.

There was concern for Giroud at the start of the second half as he fell awkwardly on his ankle while helping out his defence.

A former player for Olympiacos was firstly a former player of Arsenal. “This time it is the opposite”, added Wenger.

“We could have done better on the first two goals but that’s Arsenal for you”.

Any hope of a comeback from the hosts though was extinguished when Italian referee Nicola Rizzoli awarded a penalty against Omar Elabdellaoui for handling Nacho Monreal’s shot, with Giroud sending Roberto the wrong way from the spot.

That was because Bayer Leverkusen could only draw 1-1 at home to group winners and defending European champions Barcelona in Germany, unable to find the victor they needed after the in-form Javier Hernandez cancelled out Lionel Messi’s opener.

Ahead of the clash, Arsene Wenger insisted his squad could be a real danger in the latter rounds of the Champions League – so long as they get there.

A 3-2 defeat to the Greek champions at the Emirates Stadium in September left Arsenal playing catch up in their Champions League group. The Gunners didn’t have the best of starts to the campaign with a couple of losses but recovered and now have the opportunity to make it out of the group stage with a two-goal victory over Olympiakos. He even goes on to say that he does not attach a lot of importance to other people’s words even when they are praising him.

“Maybe it is a lucky year for us in the Champions League, you never know”. “We have to really give everything so that we can achieve this and get through to the next round”. “We play against a side that will be motivated but we face that every week”.

“In the Champions League it’s one level up and we need to be all focused”. We took our chance and we took it seriously tonight and we deserved it. We played great football up front and Olivier executed well tonight.

‘One of the Arsenal head scouts is well-known so I know that he was at the ground during the game’.