Mikel Arteta has slammed the decision to allow Crystal Palace midfielder James Macarthur to stay on the pitch shortly before the break, after his malicious tackle on Bukayo Saka resulted in the wonderkid missing the second half.
The Gunners were 1-0 up at the time, and Saka had taken one for the team, when tripping his opponent and given away the foul as their side tried to push up the field, and duly received a yellow card in the process.
Macarthur clearly didn’t take the action too well however, as not a minute later he lashed out at the first given opportunity to take out our young star, but the official only brandished a yellow for what was deemed a wholly unnecessary action.
Saka limped for the remaining minutes of the half, but was unable to continue after the break, and Arteta believes his side were punished on the losing end on two counts following the incident.
“If we want to detect things that are really relevant in a game and can change a football match, then they have to be looked at,” Arteta explained after the final whistle(via Football365).
“That situation is not only affecting them, but we have to take the player off because of the action so it is affecting it two different ways. It is not right.
“You (need to) make a straight decision, when it is so clear and so obvious straight away and they have to play with 10 men.
“Bukayo could not continue, we had to take him off at half-time, I saw the action and I can’t believe how the player continued on the pitch.
“I don’t get it. With what we were explained at the start of the season and what happened tonight, it doesn’t make any sense.”
While I completely agree that the referee should have sent their player off, and that it is disgusting that we were forced to lose Saka for the second half, our team should still have been able to win at home without him and against 11 men, although the incident definitely needs to be looked at again by the powers-that-be.
Patrick
the football is dreadful. this needs addressing. i dont care about mike dean being a bad ref. we know that.
Control what we can and work on our rubbish play….we can’t control a ref.
We were horrific, this is just a failing managers attempt to deflect
No getting away from the fact that the decision was what you would expect from Mike Dean but we shouldnt be relying on these decisions to help us ,we should be beating palace 11 against 11 and that’s the problem .
The Dog ate my Homework!!!!
Not sending Mc Arther off was a bad refereeing decision the result was a bad managerial decision.
Its your own house you should be looking at not others to try and hide its faults.
The level of officiating in the PL is so poor it beggars belief. It becomes all the more stark after watching the Euros and WCQ games where you just dont see this level of incompetence.
It’s no excuse for the team’s performance last night but gosh its frustrating.
Almost equally frustrating was the lack of any analysis of it by Sky commentators or pundits. I think one referred to it as a “high end yellow”…
There can be no further action because Dean saw it and gave it a yellow. Almost wish he hadn’t seen it as then McArthur might be looking at a suspension.
oh please, we know mike dean and so should you mikel. prepare the tactics and have a plan b and c if needed. im not calling for your head but your decisions led to this result. it is way too often arsenal gets in this situation and don’t seem to know the way out. players listen to you, they do not organize among themselves to do anything without your knowledge or approval. if that happened then it is on you and not them. and stop touching your face all of the time, we get nervous when we see you
I’m in agreement with Arteta on this and the club should be able to question Mike Dean’s competence as a PL referee.
We have been the butt of so many of his awful decisions and cannot just be coincidence that Dein always makes controversial decisions that are detrimental to our club.
I have been told that decisions even themselves out over a season, what a load of tosh!!
I have no doubt in my mind that Dean cheats when he referees our games, none whatsoever.
If AW’s idea that referees should explain their controversial decisions, how on earth would Dean explain this one?
MA has every right to bring this to the attention of fans/media, but the problem is, Riley has got his referees so protected, it’s likely MA will be punished for speaking out.
Arteta swerving on how bad Arsenal are, Tierney is a different player, we have the wrong ex-Arsenal captain at Arsenal. He has killed the Arsenal style of football, there will be no European football for Arsenal. We were dire against Brighton and Palace and will be the same against Villa. These were teams we were beating with ease, now we struggle, the sooner he goes the better
It was a dangerous kick and its quite extraordinary that it was seen and deemed a yellow. The VAR would also have seen it and considered that the referee’s decision was acceptable.
The referee’s decision was disgraceful and really should not be glossed over as the referees are supposed to ensure fair play and protect the players.
Cant argue with that.
Not sure how true this is, but it is being reported that Dean is being investigated for not looking at the var when requested to, for the challenge on Saka.