Slavia Prague 1-2 Arsenal: two goals before half-time keep Arsenal's Champions League campaign unbeaten

Arsenal had the game settled before half-time and never looked troubled by Slavia Prague's late consolation, winning 2-1 at the Fortuna Arena to extend an unbeaten start to the Champions League league phase. Noni Madueke and Viktor Gyökeres scored either side of the half-hour mark, combining directly in the move for the first, and Arsenal's lead was never seriously threatened until Wiktor Nowak pulled one back in the 90th minute with the result long since decided.

Madueke opened the scoring after nine minutes, finishing a chance created by Gyökeres, and the Swedish forward returned the favour before the half-hour was out, converting a pass from Mikel Merino in the 38th minute to make it 2-0. From there Arsenal controlled the game without needing to add to the scoreline, Mikel Arteta's side content to see out a lead that had come so early that the contest never developed into the kind of back-and-forth some of this round's other fixtures produced. Slavia's goal, when it came, changed nothing beyond the final score: Nowak finished off a David Jurásek cross in the 90th minute, a tenth-man introduction having come on earlier to set it up.

An unbeaten Champions League campaign, built on a defence that barely concedes

The win takes Arsenal to three wins and a draw from their four league-phase matches, a record that still has no defeat in it four matchdays into the competition. It is the same pattern running through Arsenal's season in both competitions: coming into this match they had won four of their last five matches in all competitions, scoring nine times and conceding only twice, a defensive record built on the kind of control that turned this game into a formality once Madueke and Gyökeres had done the early damage. Only Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain, both unbeaten themselves, currently sit above Arsenal in the 36-team table.

Gyökeres and Madueke, goal and assist each way

The two goals shared the same shape in reverse: Gyökeres created Madueke's opener, then scored the second himself off a pass from Merino. It is becoming a recurring source of Arsenal's European goals this season that the forward line and midfield rotate who finishes and who supplies, rather than leaning on one player to both make and take every chance — useful insurance for a squad that has had to manage minutes across four competitions since August, and a reason Arteta has been able to rest key players, Martin Ødegaard and Kai Havertz both introduced from the bench here rather than starting.

Slavia's season has offered little beyond moments like this

For Slavia Prague, Nowak's late goal was one of the few bright spots in a Champions League campaign that has produced one point from four matches, following a defeat to Sabah and a draw at Fenerbahçe in the previous two rounds. A club playing its first league-phase campaign under this format has found Group-of-Death-level opposition arriving every few weeks, and the gap in quality between Slavia's starting eleven and a squad as deep as Arsenal's showed from the opening minutes, Arsenal's second goal arriving before Slavia had managed a single shot on target of their own.

Match facts

• 9' — Noni Madueke, assisted by Viktor Gyökeres (Arsenal)
• 38' — Viktor Gyökeres, assisted by Mikel Merino (Arsenal)
• 90' — Wiktor Nowak, assisted by David Jurásek (Slavia Prague)
• Fortuna Arena, Prague — Champions League league phase, matchday 4, Wednesday 4 November 2026

What's next

Arsenal move to 10 points from four games, 3rd in the league phase and firmly on course for a top-eight finish and a direct run to the Round of 16. Slavia Prague stay 34th on 1 point, in the bottom third of the 36-team table, with four matchdays left to find the results that would keep their European season alive beyond the league phase.