Arsene Wenger says Arsenal will need to be "shrewd" to combat the threat of Robert Lewandowski on Tuesday night.

The Poland striker is in sparkling form with 15 goals in his last seven appearances for club and country.

Lewandowski scored the winner for Borussia Dortmund on his last visit to Emirates Stadium - almost exactly two years ago - and Wenger knows he will need special attention.

"First of all the best way to combat him is for us to have the ball," he said.

"After that you have to be shrewd with him because inside the box he is outstanding, because of his technique, his finishing, his movement inside the box.

"That’s where we need the experience of Mertesacker and Koscielny to deal with that because that will be one of the important things on the night.

"You have to respect Bayern," added Wenger. "Historically they have won the European Cup how many times? Five? And Arsenal zero. So you cannot say that historically we are at the same level as Bayern.

"They have done it in the past and they have the history and the knowledge. What we want is to get there.

"In 2015 we are the team that has taken more points than everybody else. But in Europe it’s true we have been poor in our first two games. That is what we want to correct.

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"I must say we have our backs to the wall and we play against a top, top team. So I can understand the scepticism of people. But we have to prove them wrong.

"We don’t look at the history. We look at the potential performance on the day. That’s what we try to do. The history doesn’t play the game. What will decide the game is the performance we produce. That comes from if we believe we can do it."