Despite all the foreign parts bolted on to their British chassis, Arsenal found the highways of Europe too tricky to negotiate last night. For the second season running they went off the road in the first round, losing to a Salonika side for whom an away goal scored three minutes from time by Zisis Vrizas proved decisive.

Collecting the ball 25 yards out, he side-stepped Lee Dixon and Tony Adams to shoot home from the edge of the area and nullify a brilliant solo goal by Dennis Bergkamp in the first half.

Arsenal had come into this second leg with a lot of hard work to do after a disjointed performance in Greece, where they had hardly created a chance against a team whose threat on the ball had caught many English observers by surprise.

These included Arsenal's defenders, whose normally watertight offside trap sprung a rare leak and allowed Salonika's most dangerous player, Konstantinos Fratzeskos, to score the goal that gave his side their first-leg victory.

Arsenal also stuttered going forward, with Bergkamp's absence particularly notable as his struggling team-mates tried without success to re create the same dynamic link between midfield and attack.

The youngster Nicolas Anelka played well as a rookie replacement for the Dutchman, but the chemistry between him and Wright was O Level standard compared to the PhD understanding between Arsenal's all-time top scorer and Bergkamp.

Last night's game began bittily but gradually the Arsenal midfield began to settle down and exert some grip on the match.

Emmanuel Petit fed Bergkamp in the area with a wonderful 30yard ball he just failed to control, but the maestro soon made amends. Adams's persistence on the right wing won the ball for Arsenal near the halfway line and the captain passed it astutely down the channel to Bergkamp.

The Dutch international made contact with the ball about 30 yards out on the right and immediately slipped into gear. He cut inside, reached the Salonika area, glided past Anastassios Tasiopoulos and drilled a low left-foot shot inside Nikos Michopoulos's far post.

It was yet another class goal from a class player, bringing Arsenal level in the tie and reminding them of what they had so badly missed in Greece. Bergkamp might have scored again after 37 minutes, when his fierce 20-yard shot was blocked on the line. The Salonika goalkeeper then twice dived to his right to produce flying one-handed saves from Petit and Ray Parlour, both shooting from about 25 yards.

Until Theodoros Zagorakis unleashed a 20-yard shot straight at David Seaman four minutes into the second half the Arsenal keeper had hardly been troubled, but 15 minutes later minutes Vrizas raced into the area and Adams felt obliged to bring him down, an unnecessary foul for which he earned a booking which will put him out of Arsenal's next European game.

An away goal for the Greeks was a disastrous prospect which continually preyed on Arsenal minds, especially as they had still to score an important second goal. Bergkamp again went close when Parlour on the right found him 20 yards out, but after a slick turn he blasted over the bar.

Dixon, not for the first time, then found himself in the Salonika area, played in again by Parlour, but the full back shot at the keeper. The miss was costly, as Vrizas was to demonstrate.

After the game Arsenal manager Wenger said he felt the real killer blow had been the Fratzeskos goal which gave the Greeks a 1-0 first leg lead. "It's a huge disappointment for us, but I've congratulated my players on their performance tonight. We played very well for 90 minutes but unfortunately the UEFA Cup is over 180 minutes. "Tonight we were very unlucky. When you consider all the shots we had, and that PAOK rarely came over the halfway line, you have to say they were really lucky to beat us. But, in the end, they deserved it because they were very consistent over the two legs. Wenger said of the goal his team conceded: "We had three defenders against one forward and it didn't look at all dangerous, but I must watch it again on video to see what went wrong. It will be difficult to pick up the players because they're very disappointed, but it's all part of my job."