Odegaard reveals secrets behind Rice's free-kicks

Before every game at Emirates Stadium, Martin Odegaard lifts the lid on the mood in the camp via his captain’s notes published in the matchday programme.

Ahead of this evening's game against Brentford, the skipper reflects on an incredible night against Real Madrid, provides some insight into the decisions around Declan Rice's free-kicks, and the mindset ahead of the second leg. Here is a snippet:

The atmosphere as I led the team out of the tunnel on Tuesday night was just unbelievable. I’ve never seen anything like that at the Emirates before, we could feel that energy from the moment we got on the pitch and then throughout the game.

What you all created that night was very, very special. You helped us so much, and between us we made a beautiful night. When the stadium is alive and fired up like that, for sure it gives us so much more on the pitch. It gives you the extra fire, the motivation and the energy to do something special. These types of games especially are about small margins, so anything we can add to our performance ends up making a big difference. You gave us a lot, played every ball with us, and hopefully we repaid you with what we delivered on the pitch. There’s no better feeling than when it all comes together like that.

We deserved to win by more goals I think. Thibaut Courtois made some really good saves but we found a way through with those amazing free-kicks from Declan. I was a bit surprised for the first one, because we were standing over the ball together discussing it, and we kind of decided that we were going to cross it into the box. So that’s why I was moving behind the wall because I wanted to be ready for the rebound. But then Declan obviously saw something with the keeper or the wall, and what a great strike! He saw something in the moment and went for it.

Then the second one – it’s a joke! It’s just an unbelievable strike. We were discussing it a little bit and he said to me that maybe I should try to do what he had done on the first one, around the other side of the wall. We were looking at that but then I said for him to go for it. He had the confidence, so just go for it again. And he really did! At first we were planning to roll and stop it before shooting. We couldn’t do that, so he just went for it and it was an absolutely unreal moment.

At the final whistle we enjoyed it, but what I really liked was the reaction from every player as soon as we got back inside the dressing room. We know it’s only halfway through the tie - it’s different when you go to Madrid. We have to go there and put in another performance like the first leg if we want to get through. That was the mindset of everyone in the dressing room and it was great to see everyone focused like that straight away. 

We can’t get carried away, it was a top performance against probably the best team in Champions League history, but we know it’s going to be a tough battle out there and we have to be ready. We’ve spoken about being able to win in any context against any team and now we get a chance to prove that against Brentford.

Read the rest of Martin's notes, as well as a host of other fantastic content, by buying the Arsenal v Brentford programme either around the stadium or online.