Arsenal v Rapid Vienna live match stream

Our live stream ahead of  Thursday nights Europa League match, Arsenal v Rapid Vienna is now up, kicking off at 20.00pm BST.

You can keep an eye on the commentary as it happens below, but first, we take a preview into the fixture, lineups, predictions and much more

Arsenal will be desperate to bounce back from their lowly defeat to Wolverhampton Wanderers at the weekend.

Arteta witnessed his side score a long-overdue goal from open play in the Premier League as Gabriel Magalhaes powered a header home, but strikes from Pedro Neto and Daniel Podence saw Wolves come out on top and condemn Arsenal to a third top-flight defeat in a row on familiar territory.

The Gunners, like many teams, are afflicted with numerous injuries at the moment, but Arteta has now overseen Arsenal’s worst-ever start to a Premier League season after 10 matches and a top-four charge already looks dead in the water heading into the festive period.

Since losing their opening two group matches, Rapid Vienna have notched up seven goals in two successive victories against Dundalk to keep their knockout dreams alive and confirm the Irish side’s elimination in the process.

With Molde expected to further their own bid for a top-two finish with a victory against Dundalk on matchday five, Rapid Vienna will know that nothing less than a win at the Emirates – however difficult that may be – will do before their crunch showdown with Molde in the final round of group matches.

Arsenal are already through. They will be confirmed as group winners if they avoid defeat by Rapid, or if they lose 1-0 and Molde do not beat Dundalk.

In the reverse fixture on October 22nd, Rapid Vienna were defeated at home 2-1 by Arsenal.

PRESS CONFERENCE:

Mikel Arteta

on David Luiz…
He is feeling fine, obviously he had a really nasty cut but they keep monitoring him and checking him, and he was absolutely fine. We made a statement to clarify the situation.

Some people can have the perception of whether he should have continued or not, thankfully we have one of our leading authorities in this country, which is Gary O’Driscoll, our doctor, who has massive experience in not only football but rugby as well, and he knows exactly what to do. He did all the testing, he followed all the protocols and we were very comfortable for him to carry on playing.

But really you have to make a decision in one minute, when someone is bleeding, when you have a massive concussion next to you with someone whose life is under threat, and maybe it is a moment where we can think to give these people a little bit more time and use a temporary substitution for example if we find ourselves in those positions. I can tell you that everything was done in the right manner and the only aim here was to protect the welfare of the player. That’s all.
 
on how a concussion substitute would help…

If you have any doubt, at any moment and you need an extra two minutes or five minutes to check someone, maybe we can think about that.

After five minutes you need make a decision to find a sub, the player is really pushing you, he is talking about everything, David was constantly asking about Raul, he went to see Raul, he was totally conscious about the situation, the player wants to carry on playing and the doctor has to tick all the necessary boxes to be certain that the player is okay to continue. Of we have any extra doubt, okay we give them a bit more time if necessary but you cannot play as well 10 or 15 minutes with 10 men in football.

on whether Luiz could face Tottenham on Sunday…

I think he will be fit to play if the scar is healing properly and he is comfortable heading the ball, there shouldn’t be any problems.
 
on how excited they all are about having the fans back…

It is going to be extraordinary to have them back, it will feel strange, the club has done amazing work to facilitate everybody at short notice to be able to attend the stadium and I am sure it will work really well. I am feeling sorry as well for thousands of fans that I am sure would like to make it, but can’t be there.
 
on our lack of form…

Well, I am really worried with the results and the margins that we are losing games. When we analyse the games afterwards, why we are losing these football games when they are so tight, there is a reason that sometimes you win and sometimes you lose.

We need to recover that. Sometimes it’s a lack of confidence in certain moments, we concede that we’ve probably not hit our standards, and obviously the goals we need to score to win football matches more consistently. When you compare what Wolves did and what we did, in a normal scenario, we should not lose that game.
 
on the lack of goals…

Well, there are many factors, if you compare the Premier League with the Europa League, it’s different. If you look in the last few years, how the team has shared the goals in the Premier League, it’s been quite limited.

That’s not an issue that is happening now, it’s an issue that’s been happening for years. That has to be resolved. To put almost 80 per cent of that responsibility on one man is not fair. As a team, we have to resolve that.

As a team, we get into a lot of situations and sometimes the service is not right, sometimes the timing is not right, sometimes the last execution is not right but as a team there are certain things that we have to do better.

Again, it’s coming from a long way. We’ve been winning matches producing similar numbers but we’ve been very efficient. That sometimes is a state of energy, a state of mind, a state of confidence that you are doing everything right.

When it gets to the moment you hit [the ball] and it doesn’t hit the post, and if it does hit the post, it goes in. That’s the difference. Football in the end is about the cohesion and the energy and belief of the team. When you lose games that gets touched and that’s one of the beauties of this sport, how you react against that adversity.
 
on how we’re going to spread goals around the team…

I never think about the future in a negative way. I try to work as hard as possibly can to believe that it is good to get changed tomorrow. I think it is the first time in the Premier League that we’ve produced 33 crosses. I’m telling you if we do that more consistently, we’re going to score more goals. If we put the bodies that we had in certain moments during that game in the box, it’s maths, pure maths. It will happen. It’s about how consistently we can do that, with what level of quality. We will keep trying, don’t worry.
 
on what differences he expects from the first game..

Nothing different, I think we know each other much better now after the first game where we had periods where we had difficulties to attack, the way they set-up. I saw a really committed team, really going into every challenge really focused. They were hard to beat, they went ahead after we conceded a goal and the team had a really good reaction after that so they need to win and I’m expecting that they come here with the aim to make it difficult and to come here and try to win the game again.
 

on whether the Europa League will be treated differently…

We’ve been really consistent in other competitions. Apart from the Premier League, I think we’ve played 16 competitive games and we’ve won 10, lost five and drawn one and all of them in the Premier League. We cannot treat any game differently. We go there tomorrow with a really bad taste for losing the game against Wolves and we have to put it right. The best way to do it is to be at your best level and win football matches.

FORM:

Arsenal Europa League form: WWWW
Arsenal form (all competitions): WWLDWL

Rapid Vienna Europa League form: LLWW
Rapid Vienna form (all competitions): WWDLWD

LINEUPS:

Arsenal possible starting lineup:
Runarsson; Cedric, Mustafi, Holding, Maitland-Niles; Xhaka, Elneny; Pepe, Smith Rowe, Nelson; Lacazette

Rapid Vienna possible starting lineup:
Gartler; Stojkovic, Hofmann, Barac, Ullmann; Grahovac, Knasmullner; Schick, Demir, Fountas; Kara

SPORTSMOLE PREDICTION:

Arsenal 3-1 Rapid Vienna

Arsenal are in need of a serious injection of confidence before they prepare for a North London derby against Premier League leaders Tottenham Hotspur, and the visit of Vienna gives the Gunners the perfect opportunity to right the wrongs of the weekend.

Gooners will certainly not be getting ahead of themselves should Arsenal come out on top as expected, and Vienna will look to hurt Arteta’s men – with the Arsenal boss certainly a man under pressure now – but this ought to be a routine win for the North London outfit.

Time to take a look at our Arsenal v Rapid Vienna live match stream as it happens…