Wenger Placing Unnecessary Pressure On Ozil To Perform

A rejuvenated Mesut Ozil looked to be back to his best form in Arsenal’s 4-1 FA Cup win over Everton on Saturday. The 25-year-old score the opening goal and produced a trademark killer pass in the closing stages to round off a magnificent personal performance. This will fill Ozil's manager Arsene Wenger with great optimism ahead of tonight’s Champions League encounter against Bayern Munich.

Wenger told Sky Sports that the club’s record signing has now fully recovered mentally from his penalty miss in the first-leg and hopes the Germany international will begin to add more goals to his game.

However, I believe Wenger has inadvertently heaped more pressure on Ozil to produce another world-class display, only this time at the Allianz Arena. The Gunners will be tackling a completely different animal in Bayern Munich. The German giants are currently on a Bundesliga-record 16-game winning streak and Arsenal will be huge underdogs going into this evening’s game.

I have no doubts that the German international can hold his own against the very best of Europe, but Arsenal cannot be reliant solely on the creative talents of Ozil to help inspire an unlikely comeback. The superb form of the injured Aaron Ramsey certainly helped ease the burden on the shoulders of Ozil and it is going to take a superhuman performance from every one of Wenger’s men to turn this tie around. Even then, that might not be enough.

Bayern's last two defeats in all competitions were against English opposition - to Arsenal last season and Manchester City in the Champions League group stage this season. Surely lightening can't strike a third time?

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