Porto, Hamburg, CSKA Moscow. These draws are swings and roundabouts. Last season Arsenal played three teams at this stage that weren’t even good enough to make the final 32 this time around. The trio they face between now and the end of 2006 are better. And no-one should take qualification to the knockout stages for granted.

Arsenal have to play their way into the new stadium. Matches there, despite the support of the majority of the crowd, are effectively at a neutral venue until the players have been through their matchday routines a few times and settled in properly. Additionally, the stadium must appear pretty impressive to many visiting teams, so much so that come will raise their game – the Wembley effect we witnessed two years running when the board fist experimented to see if there was enough of a market to move to a bigger stadium than Highbury. We may be getting the benefit in the long term, but it cost Arsenal Champions League progress at a time when frankly, they were good enough to win the thing had they been playing home matches at Highbury.

The job against Dinamo Zagreb was done in the first leg and although the Croatians had reason enough to play a more attacking game than they did last night, their tactics weren’t that far off from working. They could easily have been two up before Ljungberg’ equaliser and the home side could have got the collywobbles. The Gunners’ eye was off the ball in more ways than one and a sloppy, disjointed display bred little confidence for the campaign ahead. But as I say, the tie was realistically dead after the first leg, so I won’t be too harsh. Ultimately, the Champions League is all about sticking around and it doesn’t really matter how you do it as long as you are in the next round.

None of the three opponents are going to be pushovers either home or away. To ensure getting through, Wenger’s men will have to resort to the result football at times required in the knockout phase of last season. Playing tight – five in midfield – reducing the number of opportunities to the opposition and making the most of any that come their own way, Fortunately, the discipline of European survival has now been learnt and the team can go into the group stage with confidence, although arrogance would be foolish. They need to cut out the individual errors that were committed in the second leg against Zagreb and play more like they did in the game in Croatia.

Ultimately, the Champions League is a cup competition in which fortune plays a part, but at least in the group phase, one bad night does not normally mean an automatic exit. Arsenal just have to make sure they have a couple of good ones and get results enough over the course of the six matches to get through. After that the road is one they have travelled before and now need not fear.

It was good to see Ashburton Grove under floodlights last night. In time such evenings will become more familiar, but even at Highbury, night games were always a bit special, no matter how many you’d been to. There is something more intense about the light on the pitch, adding to the drama as if we are watching a stage in the spotlight.

Many of the fans are already disenchanted with the new stadium and long for the days of Highbury. An inevitable feeling that for many, will never really die. All we can do at the new venue is make new memories so that gradually, the mythology of Ashburton Grove is built up in our minds, as new history is made. The move has been made for good reasons and although there are unquestionably teething problems aplenty, do not consider the stadium a finished article as yet. There is plenty of room for improvement – let’s hope that comes in time. And for anyone who believes everything should have been done before the first match was played, one word. Wembley. At least Arsenal’s new home is capable of staging matches to capacity crowds, although those with good memories will recall that originally the stadium was scheduled to open in 2005. The problems raising the finance took care of that, but at least once the building started it remained pretty much on schedule. No mean feat in these days of delays on the majority of significant building projects.

It’s been mentioned by a few people how the architecture of the stadium seems to keep the noise in, so I really look forward to the matches against the likes of Spurs, Chavski and Man Utd when the crowd find their voice and seriously intimidate the opposition. Something that happened a little too rarely in the final seasons at Highbury, which was of course a far more open stadium.

Finally, a word on the old girl. It’s a sad sight to see the North Bank without the seats. Even worse was me catching sight of a digger demolishing the seats in the Clock End through an open gate last week, using the digger’s shovel as a battering ram. Not pretty. The broken seats were scooped up and unceremoniously deposited into a huge black container which was then driven way to what I presume would be a landfill site. At least we can look at it this way. The building workers seem to all be eastern Europeans, so the chances that a Spurs fan has destroyed your pew are slim, unless he’s a relative of Dmitri Berbatov!