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Resurgent Arsenal, Battered Chelsea Try for Last 16
Tom Williams | October 31, 2011

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Paris. Growing in confidence with each game, Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal can confirm its recent resurgence by reaching the Champions League last 16 with a victory at home to Marseille on Tuesday.

After a wretched start to the season, in which it won just three of its first eight games and was humiliated 8-2 by Manchester United, Arsenal is on a run of eight wins in nine matches.

The most recent of those victories was the most striking, a stunning 5-3 win at Chelsea on Saturday that thrust the Gunners back into the race for a top-four place.

“We are more consistent now and we have to keep that going. Tuesday night will be another test, where we will have to focus and produce that quality again. That’s what is at stake,” Wenger said.

Like Arsenal, Marseille struggled at the start of the season but appears to have turned a corner. Saturday’s 3-2 victory at promoted Dijon was the club’s third victory in succession in all competitions and lifted the team up to ninth in the Ligue 1 table.

In the other Group F fixture, Borussia Dortmund hosts Olympiakos needing victory to keep its qualification hopes flickering. The German champs are just one defeat away from elimination.

Chelsea will bid to turn the page on a damaging week with a win at Genk in Group E.

Saturday’s loss to Arsenal was the first time Chelsea conceded five goals at home in a league game since December 1989 and came amid racism allegations swirling around captain John Terry.

However, if it wins and Valencia fails to beat Bayer Leverkusen in the other group game, Chelsea will go through.

In Group H, top two AC Milan and Barcelona will look to maintain momentum ahead of a Nov. 23 meeting between the sides likely to decide who tops the group.

AC Milan visits BATE Borisov today, with Barcelona away at Czech champions Viktoria Plzen.

With just three points separating surprise leaders Apoel Nicosia and fourth-placed Shakhtar Donetsk, Group G is the tightest in the competition.

Apoel hosts Europa League champion Porto, with Shakhtar at Russian Premier League leader Zenit Saint Petersburg.

Agence France-Presse