Reason why Arsenal and Man City play on the same night in Champions League quarter-finals in blow to UK broadcasters

The Champions League quarter-final schedule has posed an unusual dilemma for both British broadcasters and neutral supporters.

Manchester City and Arsenal are both through to the last 16 of the competition after beating Copenhagen and Porto respectively.

The Premier League giants are now preparing for their upcoming matches in a bid to continue their journey to European glory.

Reigning European champions Man City have been drawn against Real Madrid, live on talkSPORT 2, in what will be a blockbuster clash.

Meanwhile, Arsenal will face Harry Kane’s Bayern Munich for a place in the semi-final, live on talkSPORT at the same time on Tuesday.

These two links should be enticing and British broadcasters will be rubbing their hands at the thought of showing them.

However, difficulties arose after the dates were confirmed.

City and Arsenal will both play their first legs on Tuesday April 9 at 8 p.m. and their return matches on Wednesday April 17 at the same time.

Usually they will be scheduled on different days, however, due to Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid being drawn at home for the first leg, the Spanish teams have been split.

This is likely due to police concerns about both Madrid teams playing at home at the same time.

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UEFA appears to have given this priority when scheduling, resulting in Arsenal and Man City having to play on the same day.

And it’s a big blow for broadcasters who will only be able to broadcast one of the matches on their main channels when normally they would both be broadcast on them.

For example, here at talkSPORT, the Arsenal clash will be broadcast on our main talkSPORT station while City will be on talkSPORT 2.

And for TNT Sports, which broadcasts all Champions League matches on television, one match is scheduled to be on TNT Sports 1 and the other on TNT Sports 2.

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This will perhaps lead to a reduction in the audience and viewership of these huge European meetings.

This will also frustrate neutral fans who will now have to choose which game to watch rather than having the luxury of being able to see both nights back to back.

On social media, one fan said: “Arsenal v Bayern and Real Madrid v Man City on the same night! What a ridiculous decision by UEFA. The Spanish police obviously objected to Real and ‘Atletico play the same night, that’s understandable, but UEFA should have reversed the draw against Atletico like they did against Inter last year.’

Another wrote: “It’s an absolute scandal that they had Arsenal v Bayern and Madrid v City on the same night.”