Arsenal reached the last 16 of the Europa League by comfortably seeing off BATE Borisov 3-0 on Thursday and overturning a first-leg deficit that had threatened one of the tournament favourites with elimination.
BATE came into the clash at the Emirates with hopes of an upset after beating Arsenal 1-0 in Belarus last week, but the hosts were level on aggregate after just three minutes when Zakhar Volkov sliced Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s low cross past Denis Scherbitski in his own goal.
Emery’s side poured forward and put themselves deservedly ahead in the tie when Shkodran Mustafi thumped home a header six minutes before the break.
Maksim Skavysh missed a good chance to put BATE ahead on away goals when Arsenal failed to clear three minutes after the restart, but another powerful header, this time from Sokratis on the hour mark, put the Gunners into Friday’s draw.
“We wanted this result but also we wanted to play for our supporters here, to improve and build our mentality after the first match away, which was not good. We did our best to come back (in the tie) and the team worked very well,” Emery told BT Sport. “The players did our game plan as we wanted and they arrived in the box a lot with a lot of crosses. And we showed the efficiency we went, which we didn’t have away.”
Arsenal will be joined by another of the tournament favourites in Napoli after Carlo Ancelotti’s team, who have struggled for goals recently, breezed to a 2-0 win over FC Zurich that saw them win 5-1 on aggregate. Adam Ounas starred on the night for the Serie A outfit after laying on Simone Verdi’s 43rd-minute opener before scoring the hosts’ second with 15 minutes left.
“We reached our objective with a serious performance, without causing ourselves too many problems,” said Ancelotti. “I’m satisfied because we’ve refound our scoring touch … sometimes we’re too altruistic (in front of goal).
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