Mikel Arteta was left furious over the refereeing decisions made during Arsenal’s one all draw against Brentford at the Emirates Stadium yesterday.
Arsenal who lost 1-0 to Everton the previous weekend had looked set to return to winning ways courtesy of Leandro Trossard’s first goal for the club, but Ivan Toney’s equalizer ended such hopes.
Toney’s goal was a subject of a lengthy VAR check! Brentford defender Ethan Pinnock appeared to be offside while blocking Arsenal’s Gabriel as a free-kick was delivered into the box for Toney to score.
Speaking after the game, Arteta said:
“I just looked at it back and it is offside. We’ll probably be given an explanation later in the week but today we haven’t got any.
“Looking at the images, you have to apply certain principles in defending and you do that by sticking to the rules and suddenly you apply different rules then you have to change your principles. So tell us before because then you don’t hold the line that high because you’re always going to have an advantage if you get blocked.
“It’s too late, the goal was allowed, we dropped two points.”
Arsenal’s last three conceded goals have been headers. Asked whether defending set-pieces was a weakness for his team, Arteta said:
“Of course, we want to improve in every area. We are the third-best team in terms of defensive set-pieces in the league. We want to be the best.
“Set-pieces are Brentford’s biggest strength and we controlled them quite well but in that situation, we were hoping they were going to be offside but they weren’t. It’s always unfortunate. Set-pieces cost you points, they are huge in this league.”
Arsenal lead the table standings with six points, but that lead will be reduced to three should Man City win their game against Aston Villa that will be played later today .
