Arsenal will be eliminated in the Champions League round of 16, because that’s what always happens

Arsenal has drawn Bayern Munich in the round of 16 of this year’s Champions League. Wonderful. Just wonderful. No one expected this, at all. The next surprise is sure to be Arsenal losing the tie. Very original. Arsène Wenger’s team hasn’t advanced past the round of 16 since the 2010-2011 season. In that time, they’ve faced and lost to Barcelona, Monaco, Bayern, Bayern, AC Milan, and Barcelona again.

This year there’s hope! Arsenal is on a spectacular run of form with its stars at their best. Alexis Sánchez is scoring for fun; Mesut Özil is being angelic as always; Theo Walcott has accepted and grown formidable in his role on the right. The midfield is mostly fit. The defense now actually has players who can tackle and, well, defend, rather than being a collection of misfit toys. Petr Cech can catch the ball and stop shots unlike Manuel Almunia and Łukasz Fabiański, and he hasn’t shown any indication that he smokes cigarettes in the showers like Wojciech Szczęsny.

But hope is the defect of the human psyche. It makes the subsequent pain greater. Leo Tolstoy knew this:

“Always the same. Now a spark of hope flashes up, then a sea of despair

rages, and always pain; always pain, always despair, and always the same.”

We’ve been here before. Always the round of 16. Always a terrible performance in the first leg and then a hopeful one in the second. Always an exit. Bayern, Barcelona, Bayern, Bayern, Barcelona. Always the same. “It’s impossible, impossible, to go on like this.”

All the games aren’t alike though, and, within this madness, this despairing repetition, there’s some hilarity and stories to be found. And because the round of 16 seems to be Arsenal’s theme for the Champions League, here are 16 of those observations about the previous six exits.

1. 2015/2016, Barcelona 3-1 Arsenal (agg: 5-1). Mathieu Flamini started the game in a midfield two with Mohamed Elneny. Flamini did as Flaminis are wont to do and was yellow carded by the 32nd minute. Realizing his mistake, Wenger subbed off Flamini at halftime for Francis Coquelin. Coquelin did as Coquelins are wont to do, Arsenal as Arsenal does, and Luis Suárez and Lionel Messi both scored to end the game ... as they are liable to do.

2. Arsenal’s backup keeper in that game was Matt Macey. No you have not heard of him. More bizarre than that, Danny Welbeck (you may have forgotten him) started and played 73 minutes before being subbed off for Walcott.

3. 2014/2015, AS Monaco FC 0-2 Arsenal FC (agg: 3-3, Monaco win on away goals). The hope! Always the hope. Olivier Giroud scored in the 36th minute, Arsenal took 16 shots, got seven on target, and Aaron Ramsey scored in the 79th. Just enough time to inspire that dreadful hope within a fan base that has suffered the subsequent disappointment many times. “The valiant effort to overturn the first leg deficit was in vain” could very well replace the present Arsenal motto, “victory grows through harmony.”

4. Dimitar Berbatov, Anthony Martial, Geoffrey Kondogbia, Wallace, and Yannick Carrasco were on that Monaco team. Back then Carrasco was still an innocent man. Back then, he hadn’t made his fame by taking Santiago Arias’ spirit from his body.

5. Welbeck started this game, as well, and was subbed off in the 72nd minute for Walcott. Interesting. Very interesting.

6. 2013/2014, FC Bayern München 1-1 Arsenal FC (agg: 3-1). When Bayern became a trigger word for Arsenal fans — the second year in which they had eliminated the Gunners. Bastian Schweinsteiger scored in the 55th minute, and Lukas Podolski equalized two minutes after. The game paled in comparison to the love story in those two goals. Schweinsteiger looks at Podolski the way Pep Guardiola looks at V-neck sweaters: with wonderment, appreciation, and childish glee. Podolski feels the same way, maybe even stronger. It must have pained him greatly to be the cause of pain to his soulmate, even if it was momentarily and inconsequential to the greater result.

7. Claudio Pizarro didn’t participate in the game, but he is a god and should be revered as such. It’s my belief that his presence on that team alone was the reason that Bayern advanced.

8. 2012/2013, FC Bayern 0-2 Arsenal FC (agg: 3-3, Bayern win on away goals). The away goals. Always the away goals. Nothing props up a moral victory loftier than losing on away goals. It’s not that you didn’t win, but that the system is flawed. And though it may be true — that every goal should be worth the same — that belief expends great effort clutching at straws. Losing on away goals is the Arsenal of defeats. The fourth place is like a trophy of losses.

9. Beating Jupp Heynckes’ Bayern, the eventual Champions League winners, 0-2 at their own stadium. Needing three goals to progress after, and this is a shocker, a disastrous first leg, Olivier Giroud scored within the first three minutes of the game. But that’s not enough. Arsenal must take you to the brink, only winning by one goal would have been merciful to Arsenal fans. Three goals were needed, so it is only reasonable that Laurent Koscielny scores in the 86th minute to dare the fans to imagine the possibility of another goal. That dreaded flash of hope again. Maybe this would be the time that the elusive goal that sends Arsenal through finally happens. It wasn’t.

10. Tomáš Rosický, Abou Diaby, Andrey Arshavin, Gervinho, and Thomas Vermaelen were on that Arsenal team. The names read like imaginary creatures from the world of Harry Potter. Fantastic, Broken Players and Where to Find Them. It was such a whimsical time back in 2013. We were never deserving.

11. Once again, Claudio Pizarro was on the bench for Bayern. The evidence of his divinity continues to swell.

12. 2011/2013, Arsenal FC 3-0 AC Milan (agg: 3-4). Milan hold on after gallant Arsenal fightback. There’s so much comfort in the familiar.

13. Urby Emanuelson and Robinho being on that Milan team was unintentionally hilarious. They looked so much alike. It was the second coming of pre-fro Marcelo and Robinho. Also, I used to think that Emanuelson would be a great player. For that I would like to apologize to everyone reading this, and to God, my friends, and family for my insolence.

14. Park Chu-Young, Marouane Chamakh, Ignasi Miquel, and Oğuzhan Özyakup. Fantastic, Forgotten Players and Where to Find Them.

15. 2010/2011, FC Barcelona 3-1 Arsenal FC (agg: 4-3). The beginning of the cycle, the start of the flat circle. The wound that aches until this day; because disasters don’t just happen to us and heal, they continuously assert their power. They become part of our being. The scar is always there, you just learn to live with it. A 1-0 victory against Guardiola’s Barcelona at home, and a 1-3 loss at the Camp Nou. Hope, and then despair.

16. It’s more than just the scoreline alone. This is the most infamous of games. The injustice of injustices. Cesc Fàbregas’ ill-timed backheel that sent Andrés Iniesta into Arsenal’s box, allowing him to provide the assist for Messi’s first goal. The Judas. His dream to return to Barcelona was an open secret, but to betray Arsenal in front of the watching world was brazen, to say the least.

Then the Red Card. Arsenal had equalized through a Sergio Busquets own-goal in the 53rd minute and were firmly on the front foot. In the 56th, Robin van Persie was sent through on goal, but he had been judged offside. Not hearing the whistle, as the crowd was deafening, he still took a shot on goal. An action that strikers often commit without punishment, especially in an understandably loud and tense atmosphere but the referee, Massimo Busacca, would not have it. He sent him off. Xavi Hernández scored soon after and then Messi again. And thus the conspiracy of “UEFALona” and the cycle of round of 16 exits was born.

Arsenal will play Bayern Munich in the round of 16 of the 2016/2017 Champions League, and they will lose. They will make silly mistakes in the first game and concede enough goals that the second leg, where they will be dominant, will be incredibly tense, even for neutrals. Because Arsenal will score enough goals in that second game to brings themselves to the edge of qualification. They will need just one goal with less than five minutes remaining. And they won’t get it. This is just the way things are.

If by some miracle Arsenal actually do go past this round of 16, as they did in 2009/2010, then they’re sure to meet Barcelona in the quarterfinals. As they did that year. Always the same.