UEFA Champions League: Saka starts, Lookman, Tella on the bench

Bukayo Saka has been named in Arsenal’s starting X1 for the Gunners’ UEFA Champions League game against Portuguese side, Sporting CP at the Estadio Jose Alvalade in Lisbon.

This would be his fourth start in four games after missing the team’s 1-0 defeat of Shakhtar Donetsk at the Emirates stadium last month.

The 23-year-old has scored once in the competition so far this season, netting the Gunners’ second goal in the 2-0 defeat of Ligue 1 giants, PSG at the Emirates at the start of last month.

Saka has scored five goals and made four assists in 12 appearances in the competition and will be looking to score for sixth time in the competition.

At the Wankdorfstadion in Bern, Switzerland, Nigeria’s Ademola Lookman will not be starting the game for the first time after starting the previous four where he has scored twice and provided one assist.

The Nigerian will be hoping to come in at some stage and score his third goal in the competition to reach double figure of goals for Atlanta across all competitions for the third season in a row.

At the BayArena, Nathan Tella will be aiming to play a part in Bayer Leverkusen’s game against RB Salzburg.

Tella has started just one of the three matches he has played in the competition but has neither scored nor provided an assist.

The 25 year old will be hoping he plays at some stage and either score or bag an assist which will be his first in the competition.