Manchester City right-back Kyle Walker has revealed which team he would have rather faced in the Champions League this season: Arsenal or Bayern Munich.
If Kyle Walker’s Manchester City side had beaten Real Madrid in the Champions League quarter-final this campaign, they would have played against Bayern. The German giants beat Arsenal 3-2 over two legs in the quarter-final of the competition as well.
However, both English clubs were eliminated, as Bayern also eventually lost 3-2 to Real Madrid on aggregate in the semi-finals.
Kyle Walker reveals who he would’ve rather faced: Arsenal or Bayern
During his side’s treble-winning season, City’s number two did not get a chance to go toe-to-toe with Bayern over both legs as he was injured.
Thankfully for Walker, his teammates pulled through and vanquished the Bundesliga side in a 4-1 win over both legs on aggregate.
But this season, if given the choice to have faced either Arsenal or Bayern in the Champions League semi-final, Kyle Walker would have rather Manchester City avoided the English team.
On BBC’s You’ll Never Beat Kyle Walker, he said: “There’s certain teams that you want to avoid in certain cup situations. I’m thinking, if we got through the Real Madrid [tie], I’d have preferred Bayern than Arsenal.”
Walker continued: “Just because Arsenal are a really good team at the minute. Really good team at the minute. I think, obviously, Mikel’s [Arteta] gone a lot from what we’ve done at City and put it into Arsenal but you do need the players.”
“And I think the recruitment’s been fantastic. This is more like the Arsenal teams that were from before.”
Understandable why Kyle Walker has chosen Arsenal as his pick
Having witnessed Arsenal beating Manchester City and earning a draw against them at the Etihad Stadium while having seen his batter Bayern last year — one can gauge where Kyle Walker is coming from.
It would be fair to claim that despite the Bavarian heavyweights getting the better of Mikel Arteta’s side in Europe’s elite competition, the North London side have had a superior season.
Arteta’s troops finished two points behind City and Walker admitted that his team will have to raise their level to ensure they beat the Gunners in the title race moving forward, which goes to show how highly he rates their team.
Bayern finished 18 points behind Bayer Leverkusen in third place in the Bundesliga, with VfB Stuttgart finishing above them as well in what was a sorely disappointing campaign for them.