BERLIN: Arsenal need to right their rapidly sinking ship when they travel to AC Milan for their Europa League last-16 first leg on Thursday.

The Gunners have lost four straight matches, and eight of their last 13, leading to what has become an annual ritual of widespread calls for manager Arsene Wenger to go.

Sixth in the Premier League, 13 points off the top four, their only realistic chance of qualifying for the Champions League next term is by winning the Europa League.

With that in mind Wenger rested midfielder Aaron Ramsey and only brought on defender Hector Bellerin and Danny Welbeck, his only available striker for the Europa League, as late substitutes in Sunday’s 2-1 loss at Brighton & Hove Albion in the Premier League.

“Yes [it’s a sign of the Europa League’s importance], because we have to be realistic,” Wenger said.

“We need two teams to collapse [in the Premier League]. I can’t see that at the moment, because two teams to drop so many points is very difficult to imagine.

“Of course the Europa League becomes important. It’s a massive game in Milan.”

Unfortunately for Arsenal, Gennaro Gattuso’s Milan are on a positive run, with six wins and two draws from their last eight domestic matches.

Milan had the weekend off as Serie A games were postponed Sunday to honour the death of Fiorentina captain and former Milan player Davide Astori. The Italy international, who was just 31, will be mourned with a minute’s silence ahead of this week’s Europa League games.

Lazio, Italy’s other remaining entrants, take on Dynamo Kiev in Rome where they plan to rest some of the players who lost on penalties in the Italian Cup semi-final against Milan last Thursday and suffered a last-gasp 1-0 defeat to Juventus on Saturday.

Midfielders Sergej Milinkovic-Savic and Senad Lulic are likely to sit on the bench alongside Serie A top-scorer Ciro Immobile.

Atletico Madrid host Lokomotiv Moscow just four days after the disappointment of losing to Barcelona in La Liga, effectively ending their outside hopes of the title.

The Europa League therefore takes on extra importance and although Stefan Savi is still nursing a hamstring strain, coach Diego Simeone has no new injury worries.

But he is still expected to make several changes from the starting XI that faced Barcelona on Sunday.

Diego Costa will start up front though with Antoine Griezmann, who will play his 50th game in Europe for Atletico.

Ahead of the duel between former beaten finalists Olympique de Marseille and Athletic Bilbao, the Basques’ coach Jose Angel Ziganda can call on left-back Mikel Balenziaga as he returns after an absence of 11 weeks with a right thigh injury.

It’s not all good new for Ziganda, however. with a number of players injured or cup-tied for the trip to France.

Midfielder Benat Etxebarria is wary of Marseille.

“They have attacking players who don’t need much of an opportunity to score a goal,” he said.

“We have to make sure they are not comfortable. They are at home so we know we will be under pressure but we will have chances and we need to take them.”

RB Leipzig and Borussia Dortmund drew 1-1 in the Bundesliga last weekend and now face Europa League first legs at home to Zenit St. Petersburg and Salzburg respectively.

Salzburg will take their largest away following since entering the Red Bull stable in 2005 with 2,000 fans heading for Dortmund.

The other ties are Sporting Lisbon against Viktoria Plzen and CSKA Moscow against Olympique Lyonnais. The second legs are next week.

Published in Dawn, March 8th, 2018