The familiar collapsing feeling, Sanchez’s petulance and other talking points from Bayern vs Arsenal

Football is a strange game, or at least that was Carlo Ancelotti’s assessment at 9.57 pm London time. The scoreline read 2-10, on aggregate, yet he conceded that Arsenal had troubled Bayern Munich. The Italian’s sympathy vote was gallant. Again, Arsenal, who have long cocooned in a baffling parallel universe, crossed into a realm of perdition, teetering on the edge of burlesque self-parody.

1. Valiant Arsenal collapse

At least, the Londoners managed symmetry, with another farcical 1-5 defeat at the hands of Bayern Munich: with the tie no longer competitive and the 90 minutes of little significance, when damage limitation was the key to allow the Londoners a dignified exit from the Champions League, Arsenal offered another distillation of fine football in the first half before imploding in slapstick fashion after the controversial sending-off of – the football gods not eschewing irony – Laurent Koscielny in the 53th minute. It was the preamble to a German blitzkrieg, the prelude to Arsenal’s piteous collapse and the provocation for further cantankerous parley about the fading managerial powers of Arsene Wenger.

And yet, Arsenal commenced the game with swagger. Their pride was at stake and Wenger had demanded “lucid rage” from his players. They honored his poetic sentiments with a first half of swash-buckling football. This was not a disjointed team of cyclical failure, but one that demonstrated joy, fantasy, boldness, togetherness, sophistication and flair in their play. In short, a refined version of the beautiful game.

Arsenal, so often conscripted by pressure, confirmed they can still dazzle, culminating with a fine Theo Walcott goal. But a self-fulfilling prophecy has a defined outcome – Arsenal “Arsenaled”. What was worse? Alexis Sanchez, Arsenal’s marquee player, with his subliminal “I-want-to-get-out-of-here” messages, dithering in possession for Arjen Robben to deliver the coup de grace or Shkodran Mustafa’s pass into the path of three Bayern players, with Mesut Ozil motionless?

In his comments, a defiant Wenger had a singular view of the match: The referee had killed the game. Yes, dear Arsene, Arsenal should have been awarded a penalty, instead Bayern got one, resulting in the freak expulsion of Arsenal’s captain – but these were all mere details, not warranting Wenger’s words to focus on the reconstruction of an impossible achievement.

2. Not Sanchez, but Theo Walcott and Alex-Oxlade Chamberlain starred

Paris Saint-Germain, Juventus or Manchester City? Alexis Sanchez, the sulking merchant of petulance and want-away player, has ample choice in future clubs, but the high-intensity Chilean offered very little against Bayern. He had refused to drown in a morass of clownish football, but, against Munich, the match unspooled far removed, from Arsenal’s No 7, apart from a few moments of outrageous gallivanting and tip-toe ballerina acts in the periphery.

Instead, the much-maligned Walcott and Chamberlain spearheaded Arsenal’s ferocious, and ultimately fickle, assault on Bayern. Theo breezed, even waltzed his way past Xavi Alonso and David Alaba, before thundering the ball past the impeccable Manuel Neuer. Arsenal’s No 15 anchored the midfield with verve. They both played with a confidence and brutally that has so often been conspicuously absent at Arsenal.

3. Ominous Bayern for European glory?

Can Bayern win the Champions League? It is a question worth pondering, and, at the Allianz Arena – coined the “Arrogantz Arena” in non-Bavarian spheres – a point of obsession. After all, the great Guardiola was to deliver that majestic, silver cup, but the Spaniard never did. And so, the Bayern boardroom, in their lust for, not just domestic domination, but continental dominion – one club to rule them – appointed Carlo Ancelotti, a modernist coach, who does not ideate and theorise, but seeks the winning formula in a team.

However, in the first half of the season Munich were lackadaisical, neither potty with ball possession nor pragmatic the Ancelloti-way. The Italian’s introduction was to foreshadow the end of a ball-hogging neurosis, but that has not transpired. With a thumping 19-1 goal record in their last four matches, Bayern Munich still recorded high levels of ball possession – 72%, 65%, 75% and 57% against Hamburg, Schalke 04, FC Koln and Arsenal respectively.

That withering possession of the ball betrays a frightening directness that Bayern have adopted under Ancelotti. The lateral “Guardiolan” stasis is gone, and, Bayern, almost as a part of the new coach’s tried and tested blueprint, have clicked at quite the right time, within reach of glory in the German championship, the DFB Pokal and the Champions League. Thiago Alcantara has become Bayern’s No. 10, a masterstroke from Ancelotti, as his two number sixes operate with more effectiveness.

Perhaps, Arsenal and the domestic opponents, do not constitute formidable opposition, but, on current form, notwithstanding perceptible flaws in defence, Bayern can contemplate a deep run into spring in Europe.