LeeDixon

[u]Manchester City v Dortmund - 19:45, Live on Sky Sports 2[/u] Manchester City thought they had done everything necessary to pull off a famous victory in the Bernabeu. Then disaster struck and they flew back to England devastated. That's the way it goes in this competition - you can have all the money but the teams who compete for Europe's prize over many seasons keep plugging away and can often turn things around when their opponents look like 1.01 certainties. Manchester United, Madrid and Barcelona have all done it. Now City need to take three points against this talented Dortmund side. Last season, the Blues failed to do themselves justice in the Champions League. If they lose this, which I don't believe they will, the competition could pass them by again. Roberto Mancini's...

Early Champions League games can be cagey, twitchy affairs but with two powerhouses of European football coming face to face I'm expecting a full-on affair. City would snap your hand off for a draw, but it could be a good time to play Madrid. They are struggling a bit at the moment, coming off the back of a defeat to Sevilla over the weekend and currently sitting in tenth in La Liga. There will be plenty of pressure on Madrid from the home fans and this will only increase if City can make a good start. It was the start that set the tone of Sevilla's victory over Real - they put Madrid under pressure from the first whistle and, most importantly, got players around Xabi Alonso. The former Liverpool man is a massive player for Madrid; he sets the tempo and is comfortable playing it...

Chelsea's reward for eliminating Benfica is a showdown with Barcelona, the best club team in the world. Barcelona deserve all the credit they get for the way they play, the spirit with which they play, how hard they all work in terms of tracking back and closing down and of course...for the sheer number of goals they score. But they're not invincible, no-one is. Two years ago Inter Milan frustrated them over two legs playing a typically Jose Mourinho-style of pragmatic football and this season several teams in La Liga have held them, especially away from the Nou Camp. And one area where Chelsea can get the better of them is in terms of physical battles. For all their speed, trickery and skill, Barca are a small side and the bigger, stronger, heavier players in Chelsea's ranks have...

In between the devil and the deep blue sea. In between a rock and a hard place. That's the situation in which Arsene Wenger finds himself going into the second leg of this Champions League knock-out match. Arsenal were destroyed 4-0 in the first leg in Milan and, if they were to find a way of progressing, I suspect they might consider re-naming the Emirates Stadium the Arsene Wenger Stadium because it would go down as one of the biggest turnarounds in European football history. But before we get too ahead of ourselves, let's remember the Betfair market makes the Gunners 34.0 to progress and that price is actually considerably shorter than what it was; they were matched at 50.0 to go through in the aftermath of the first leg and have been shortened on the back of those two fine domestic ...

I'll do well to match my tipping effort at the weekend where all four of my recommended bets on Norwich v Arsenal won . If you'd placed £10 on each you would have returned a profit of £91.50. But the good news is that with a third of the season gone, we've seen enough of this 2011-12 version of Arsenal to know what to expect of them. The key of course, is knowing how to profit from that knowledge. [b]Match Odds[/b] If Arsenal had beaten Marseille a few weeks back like they should have, they would have been pretty much home and dry as regards making the knock-out stages of the Champions League. But [b]Arsene Wenger[/b] decided that captain, talisman and top scorer (he probably drives the team bus, too) Robin van Persie needed a rest and only gave him half an hour in that...

[u]Match Odds [/u] What a remarkable game of football that was on Saturday lunch-time. A 5-3 win away at a side who prior to this season had a fierce reputation as one of the best defensive outfits in Europe and one who started this season as one of just three teams genuinely tipped as Premier League contenders. But in a way it didn't tell us anything about Arsenal we didn't already know. Before kick-off we were well aware that they can beat anyone on their day, we know Robin van Persie is one of the best finishers in the game and we know they simply can't defend, which is why they still conceded three despite winning the match. There are three big reasons why I'm backing the Gunners to win this match. The first is that if Arsenal started their domestic season slowly, Marseille ...

[u]Marseille v Arsenal, 19:45, live on ITV1 [/u] It was an improved performance from Arsenal last time out and, after the start the Gunners have made to the season, it's good just to be going in the right direction - regardless of the deficiencies in Sunday's performance. Being an optimistic man I'm going to focus on those positives before we get stuck into the Marseille game. The first 25 minutes saw us playing some good football, possibly back to our attacking best. Upfront, Robin van Persie was in stunning form, bringing back memories of Dennis Bergkamp. At the back, Wojciech Szczesny produced a save that was world-class too. Without that stop from Lee Cattermole's point-blank header, Sunderland would have taken an unexpected lead at the break and the pressure would have been...