Mikel Arteta believes Arsenal's excellent defensive record in the Champions League can provide them with a springboard to European success this season.

Arsenal visit PSV for the first leg of a last-16 tie on Tuesday, having finished third in the Champions League's 36-team league phase, behind competition favourites Liverpool and Barcelona.

They only conceded three goals in their eight games at that stage of the competition, with only Inter (one goal against) boasting a better defensive record.

However, the Nerazzurri vastly overperformed their underlying defensive figures, having conceded chances worth 7.48 expected goals against (xGA). 

Arsenal's total of 5.82 xGA was the lowest recorded in the league phase, while they also faced the fewest shots on target (19) of any team, keeping five clean sheets.

While injuries to Gabriel Jesus and Kai Havertz have hamstrung Arsenal in attack and derailed their Premier League title bid, Arteta feels being solid at the back can make all the difference in European knockout ties.

"We had played very differently home and away in the last year, especially in Europe," Arteta said.

"We have been much more consistent, we have scored a lot of goals, we have conceded hardly anything, I think we have conceded three goals and had the lowest expected goals against in the group stage, which is great. 

"So that's a big platform, so we have those resources at the disposal of the team, it's something the team has already done and now we have to continue to do it.

"If you look at the history of the teams who have been very successful, the defensive record is critical.

"Then we have shown we have the capacity to score a lot of goals in the competition, obviously the options are different but the team still has a lot of resources to do that." 

Arsenal have been ahead on the scoreboard for 57% of their minutes played in the Champions League this season; the highest percentage of any side. 

Arteta's men have trailed for just 65 of their 770 minutes of match time in the competition this term (8%).

They have also kept a clean sheet in 63% of their games in the 2024-25 edition, only doing so in a higher percentage of their games in 2005-06 (77%, 10/13), when they made their only Champions League final appearance.