The arsenal's journey to win UCL ends over PSG on the semi-finals

 

PSG vs Arsenal 2-1: UEFA Champions League semifinal – as it happened

This page is now closed, but a summary of the football match is available below, and you can go here for our full match report.

PSG and Arsenal continue their quest to win a maiden UEFA Champions League title when they clash in the second leg of their semifinal in Paris.

 as Inter made a desperate run for an equaliser, Denzel Dumfries found 37-year-old Acerbi inside the box, who fired a first-time effort into the net to score his first European goal in his 20th season and take the game to extra time.

In the 99th minute, Marcus Thuram made a brilliant run from the right and played the ball into the area for Frattesi, who set himself up before neatly guiding a curling shot into the bottom corner to send the delighted home fans into raptures.

PSG’s away victory over the Gunners in the opening leg at Emirates Stadium on April 29 has the Parisians firming up as the favourites to progress to the final.

The Gunners face the daunting – but not impossible – task on Wednesday of needing to beat the French champions on the road if they want to reach the Champions League final for just the second time in their history.

Here is all to know before the semifinal decider between two of Europe’s most talented football clubs:

What happened in the opening leg?

PSG took a big step towards reaching the final when Ousmane Dembele’s early goal sealed a 1-0 win at Arsenal in a tense first leg of the semifinal.

Dembele fired home off the post in the fourth minute as PSG dominated the opening stages, and manager Luis Enrique’s side held firm to take a precious advantage back to the French capital.

Paris Saint-Germain beat Arsenal 2-1 in the second leg of their UEFA Champions League semifinal.

The match at Parc des Princes in Paris, France, means the home side take the tie 3-1 on aggregate.

PSG have already secured France’s Ligue 1 domestic title and are 19 points clear with two games to play.

Arsenal are second in the English Premier League, where Liverpool have already secured the title.

PSG held a 1-0 aggregate lead following the first leg in London. Inter Milan booked their place in the final by beating Barcelona 4-3 on Tuesday.

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PSG vs Arsenal 2-1: UEFA Champions League semifinal – as it happened

By Kevin Hand and Patrick Keddie

Published On 7 May 2025

7 May 2025

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This page is now closed, but a summary of the football match is available below, and you can go here for our full match report.

Paris Saint-Germain beat Arsenal 2-1 in the second leg of their UEFA Champions League semifinal.

The match at Parc des Princes in Paris, France, means the home side take the tie 3-1 on aggregate.

PSG have already secured France’s Ligue 1 domestic title and are 19 points clear with two games to play.

Arsenal are second in the English Premier League, where Liverpool have already secured the title.

PSG held a 1-0 aggregate lead following the first leg in London. Inter Milan booked their place in the final by beating Barcelona 4-3 on Tuesday.

Keep up to date: Follow Al Jazeera Sport on our website and on X for the latest news, features and live events from around the world.

Live updates

Match stats

Lineups

7 May 2025 - 22:07 (22:07 GMT)

That’s a wrap

Thanks for joining us as PSG knocked out Arsenal in an enthralling Champions League semifinal in Paris.

We will have plenty of other sport coverage soon – including Thursday’s match between Manchester United and Athletic Club, and Real Madrid against Barcelona in LaLiga on Sunday.

But for now, from Kevin Hand and Patrick Keddie, goodbye!

Next up for Al Jazeera Sport

Manchester United take centre stage on Thursday as they look to complete their passage to the final of the Europa League.

The Red Devils hold a 3-0 lead following the first leg of their semifinal against Athletic Club in Bilbao.

Do join us for all the action from Old Trafford, with all the usual build-up and analysis in advance of our live text and photo commentary stream.

Declan Rice’s post-match thoughts

“It’s gutting. Such a dominant start – if you score one of those chances, then the game turns on its head,” the Arsenal midfielder told TNT Sports 1.

“It’s the small margins in football. Two mistakes from us and two goals for them. With the chances we have missed, it felt like it wasn’t meant to be.

“Over the two legs, we could have scored three or four more goals.

“Sometimes, you have to lose a few to win, you have to overcome some of these setbacks to grow as a player and a team.

“We are going through that game at the moment, in terms of losing out on the league and the Champions League.

“We are growing as a team, but we need to keep pushing and believing. This is why we play. There will be setbacks on the way.

“PSG have gone through, but this isn’t going to define us. We’ll be back and we’ll get our players back and will be a much stronger outfit.

“We’ve played the whole season without five or six of our best players, to be where we are and do what we have done is unbelievable – I fully stand by that.

“We’ve given it everything, the whole squad has. We fully believed we could win, we put on a performance, and on another night, we score two or three.

“We are all desperate for it. We want to win trophies and be at the pinnacle of football, winning stuff.

“It’s not good enough because Arsenal are a club that deserve to win trophies.”

Mikel Arteta’s post-match reaction

“First of all, congratulations to PSG for reaching the final,” the Arsenal manager told TNT Sports.

“The assessment? I will make it when I am a little bit cooler, but the feedback straightaway from their bench is that we were much better than them.

“When you look at the two games, the best player on the pitch has been their goalkeeper. He has made a difference for them in the tie.

“I think we were much closer than the results showed. I am very proud of the players, the way we handled the pressure, and after 20 minutes, it should have been 3-0.

Arsenal’s participation in a UEFA Champions League final was 19 long years ago for Gunners fans, and they lost to Barcelona 2-1 in the 2005-2006 season at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, France.

Team news: PSG

Star striker Dembele, who limped off with a minor hamstring strain after scoring the game winner against Arsenal in the first leg in London, has been passed fit to play in the return leg, Enrique said on Tuesday.

Dembele, 27, is PSG’s top scorer this season with 33 goals in all competitions.

PSG’s regular squad is otherwise injury-free with Desire Doue tipped to re-enter the attacking winger role at the expense of France international Bradley Barcola.

“We are not there, and that has to hurt. If we want to win this competition, we need to realise that there are certain things on us. We should not just be ‘understanding’ that we are out.

“I don’t think there has been a better team in the competition than us, but we deserve much more in both games.

“This competition is about the boxes and that is about the strikers, most of the time, and the goalkeepers – and he was their best player.

“I’m so proud of the boys, and they deserve a lot of credit for what they are doing in the context and the situation, and with the amount of injuries.

“We arrived here in the worst state. You have to get here with everyone fit and with rest. We came here in a completely different context, and that gives me a lot of positivity for the future.”

No English, German or Spanish team in final for first time in 21 years

As a PSG vs Inter final awaits, it means that the Champions League final will be contested without a team from the Premier League, LaLiga, or the Bundesliga for the first time since 2004.

Team news: Arsenal

Key midfielder Thomas Partey returns to the side after sitting out the first leg against PSG with a suspension, restoring manager Mikel Arteta’s preferred midfield trio with Declan Rice and Martin Odegaard.

Jurrien Timber is questionable for this match as he continues to battle back to full fitness after a knee injury. But in some good news for the club, the Dutch defender was seen training with the Gunners squad on Tuesday shortly before they departed for France.

Porto, under a young manager named Jose Mourinho, beat Monaco in that final to lift the trophy.

Possible lineups:

Arsenal possible XI: Raya; Timber, Saliba, Kiwior, Lewis-Skelly; Partey, Rice, Odegaard; Saka, Merino, Martinelli

PSG possible XI: Donnarumma; Hakimi, Marquinhos, Pacho, Nuno Mendes; Vitinha, Fabian Ruiz, Joao Neves; Kvaratskhelia, Dembele, Doue

Head-to-head:

The teams have played on six prior occasions across all competitions:

Arsenal wins: 3

PSG wins: 1

Draws: 2

What the managers had to say:

Arsenal’s Arteta: “If you want to be in the Champions League final, you have to do something special. We’re going to have to do something special in Paris to be there.”

PSG’s Enrique: “We’re bound to suffer because our opponents don’t have a favourable result. We need to match our performance as closely as possible in the first leg to win the return leg and stay true to our ideas.”

When and where is the 2025 UEFA Champions League final?

The winner of this semifinal heads to Germany on May 31 for the Champions League final.

They relied on counter-attacking football and an excellent Gianluigi Donnarumma to prevail, advancing 3-1 on aggregate.

“The feedback straightaway from their bench is that we were much better than them,” Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta told TNT Sports after the game.

“When you look at the two games, the best player on the pitch has been their goalkeeper. He has made a difference for them in the tie.

“We were much closer than the results showed. I am very proud of the players, the way we handled the pressure, and after 20 minutes, it should have been 3-0.

“We are not there, and that has to hurt.”

PSG reached the final of Europe’s elite tournament for the second time in five years. They will take on Inter Milan on May 31 after the three-time champion defeated Barcelona 7-6 on aggregate in one of the greatest semifinals in the competition’s history.

cure the hard-fought win for Inter, who will bid to claim their fourth Champions League title and their first in 15 years after losing to Manchester City in the final two years ago.

“I’m lucky to have finished the game. I screamed so much that I saw everything black,” Frattesi told Sky Sport.

“I have to thank the physiotherapists because, in recent days, I was not well, I dedicate the victory to them. It’s incredible, I don’t know what to say. Tonight, the incredible happened.”

Barcelona, who were chasing a treble after winning the Copa del Rey by beating Real Madrid in extra-time, will now have to focus on LaLiga, where on Sunday, they host their old rivals who are in second place and trail them by four points..