Arsenal's Europa League Clash With Vitoria Moved to Staggeringly Early Wednesday Kick Off

Arsenal are set to fly out to Portugal to face Vitoria in the Europa League, but face a weird 3:50pm kick off on Wednesday 6 November, because of a scheduling

Arsenal are set to fly out to Portugal to face Vitoria in the Europa League, but face a weird 3:50pm kick off on Wednesday 6 November, because of a scheduling clash involving local rivals Braga.

Braga are set to face Besiktas in their own Europa League tie on the Thursday evening, so Vitoria's game has been moved to the earlier date.

🇩🇪 @Eintracht
🇧🇪 @Standard_RSCL
🇵🇹 @VitoriaSC1922

See you in the @EuropaLeague group stage 👋

— Arsenal (@Arsenal) August 30, 2019

News of the fixture adjustment comes from the Daily Mail, who add that Arsenal supporters may now be forced to fly out one day earlier to follow their team.

However, The Independent add that Vitoria have requested to play all their home games at that time on a Wednesday, potentially to avoid clashing with Braga.

Alongside Vitoria, Arsenal will also face Eintracht Frankfurt and Standard Liege, and the Gunners will certainly be eager to come away with as many points as possible as they target another run to the Europa League final.

They fell at the final hurdle last season, falling 4-1 to rivals Chelsea in May which saw them miss out on Champions League qualification as a result.

The Gunners will certainly be hoping to go one step further this time around, with a top four finish in the Premier League certainly not an easy challenge. With so many teams battling for a place in the competition, winning the Europa League may well be the easiest route.

Stu Forster/GettyImages

Manager Unai Emery has plenty of experience in the competition, having enjoyed a huge amount of European success with Sevilla during his time with the La Liga side. 

Under the Spaniard, Sevilla picked up three consecutive Europa League trophies, and Arsenal will certainly be eager to see similar results from their boss.