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Arsenal begin their Europa League campaign away to FC Zurich today evening as the Gunners look to bounce back from their defeat at Old Trafford.

The Gunners and European football. Sounds good, doesn’t it? While it is not the competition the club was tantalisingly close to making last year, it is a step in the right direction.

Mikel Arteta has already stated that the Europa League will be taken very seriously by the club, and they’re the early bookie’s favourites to win the competition.

Mikel Arteta’s side earned a straightforward route into the group stage courtesy of finishing fifth in the Premier League, while their hosts failed to make it through Champions League qualifying.

Unlike their more revered opponents, Zurich have experienced a taste of Champions League football in the 2022-23 season, but Franco Foda was unable to guide his side past Azerbaijan’s Qarabag in the second qualifying round as they fell to a 5-4

aggregate loss.

Dropping down to the second tier of continental competition, Zurich recovered to put five past Linfield over two legs before seeing off Hearts 3-1 on aggregate to book their place in the Europa League group stage for the fifth time in 11 years.

The 13-time Swiss champions bowed out at the group stage in each of the 2011-12, 2014-15 and 2016-17 editions, but they ended that hoodoo during their last outing in the secondary competition, going as far as the last-32 in 2018-19 before being eliminated by Napoli.

On a more sour note, FCZ have endured a bitterly disappointing start to the defence of their title in the Swiss Super League, as they are without a win from seven games in the new domestic season and have suffered three consecutive home defeats to Sion, Basel and Lugano.

Losing the highly-rated Wilfried Gnonto to Leeds United has not helped Zurich in that regard, but the 18-year-old had failed to fire in the 2022-23 Swiss Super League anyway, and recording a fifth-straight Europa League win will not be a cakewalk for the hosts.

As for Arsenal, the trio of Reiss Nelson, Thomas Partey and Mohamed Elneny are confined to the treatment room for the long-term, and Arteta has now been handed a fresh concern over Emile Smith Rowe, who appeared to pull up injured in the warm-down at Old Trafford.

The 22-year-old has been left out of the squad alongside right-back Cedric Soares (knock), although a multitude of changes can be expected either way as Matt Turner, Takehiro Tomiyasu, Rob Holding, Eddie Nketiah and Fabio Vieira aim to force their way into the first XI.

Marquinhos and Matt Smith could also make their debuts for the club after being included in the Gunners’ senior Europa League squad, and if Nketiah displaces Gabriel Jesus this week, he will aim to find the back of the net in his third Europa League start in succession.