Monaco Vs. Arsenal Recap & Highlights: Monaco Lose 2-0 But Advance to Champions League Quarterfinals On Away Goals [VIDEO]

MONACO, France – Arsenal’s Oliver Giroud and Aaron Ramsey found the back of the net to give the Gunners the 2-0 victory in hostile territory, but it was the French club AS Monaco who advanced to the quarterfinals of the UEFA Champions League thanks to the away goals tie breaker (3-3) on aggregate.

Despite the gutsy performance by the Gunners, they were unable to overcome the 3-1 defeat at the Emirates stadium three weeks ago.

Before the match, nobody gave Arsenal a chance to score the three goals necessary to advance to the quarterfinals of the Champions League. However, with Ramsey’s goal in the 79^th minute, Arsenal drew even with Monaco 3-3 on aggregate goals making the final 15 minutes of the match the most intense we’ve seen.

Arsene Wenger’s club brought all his men forward and put intense pressure on Monaco, but they fell short of forcing the third away goal which would have carried them on to the round of eight.

Giroud started the Arsenal rally late in the first half when he scored an impressive goal that had zero margin of error. Giroud attempted a shot from the left corner of the box that was blocked by a charging Monaco keeper, Danijel Subasic. The ball deflected off of Subasic and into the air where Giroud retrieved it and pitched it over the Monaco defenders into the top right corner of the net, it was Giroud’s seventh goal in eight games for the Gunners.

With the score 2-0, Arsenal thought they had broken through to the quarterfinals when Alexis Sanchez’s header from close range was saved by Subasic. The save turned out to be the save of the match as it allowed Monaco to break through on away goals.

The Gunners gave it their best effort facing nearly impossible odds, but it was not enough to advance to the final eight and Arsenal’s run in the UEFA Champions League comes to an end in the round of 16 for the fifth consecutive year.

Game Notes:
Bono, the lead singer of the band U2, was on hand to watch the match. Bono was injured in November in a brutal bicycle accident in New York City that left him with numerous fractures and a titanium rod in his elbow that may hinder him from ever playing the guitar again.