Jamie Redknapp says Arsenal is now a meaner club after they refused to put the ball out of play in the buildup to their goal against Watford.
Emile Smith Rowe scored the only goal of the game as the Gunners beat Watford 1-0 in their latest Premier League match.
However, in the build-up to the goal, Danny Rose had put the ball out of play because one of his teammates was down injured.
However, Arsenal didn’t care and restarted the play before scoring their goal.
That moment has been talked about by fans and pundits alike, but the referee allowed play to continue and saw nothing wrong in Arsenal’s action.
Redknapp believes the Gunners were a nice team before now and they wouldn’t have continued to play in those times.
However, that has changed and there is a mean streak about them now, unlike before.
‘Arsenal aren’t too nice any more,’ said Redknapp from the Sky Sports studio as quoted by The Daily Mail.
‘You can see [Albert Samba} Lokonga goes in for a foul there. Rose sees his player’s down, he kicks the ball out. Normally you would kick the ball back, that’s the sporting thing to do.
‘But Arsenal don’t, they play on. They take it quickly and they get something from it.’
Arsenal fans have been longing for their team to become this mean and stop being soft.
Mikel Arteta is truly transforming the team and it is great to see that the club kept faith in him until now.
My club 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔴⚪️❤️
I don’t think that’s the right thing to do. Wenger’s successful success (the ones that weren’t considered to be too nice) used to respect this concept and we even replayed a cup tie because kanu and overmars broke it and scored after Sheffield kicked the ball out for an injured player.
I think in this case Rose was trying to waste time because his teammate clearly wasn’t seriously injured (if I’m remembering right). Still, can see why it’s controversial. We wouldn’t like it if it was done to us (although I’d hope we’d only do it for a genuine injury concern and not to waste time!).
Wenger’s successful sides*
Well said, sir.
I think it was miscommunication as Rose could have genuinely thought that his teammate was injured.
The only acceptable reaction is to return the ball.
Come on, hardcore time wasting doesn’t start in the 55th minute. Many players stay on the ground to persuade the referee that they were victims of a hard fault, so the official might grant a free kick or a card in their favor. It wasn’t the case this time, but it doesn’t change how to assess the situation and the response.
Pardon my scorn at this “kick the ball out when their player is injured” hypocrisy but in ALL other situations in football , cheating is rife but in this ALONE, it has been the rule to not cheat and adopt sportsmanship.
Well, of course players should not cheat and should always be sporting. BUT when this single, though customary, act of sportsmanship is commonly observed but CHEATING HAPPENS IN EVERY OTHER FOOTBALL SITUATION, it is rank hypocrisy to expect cheats not to cheat on this single occasion.
Cheating is one prime reason I detest the dishonesty in football but lets be honest and insist – BY DRACONIAN PUNISHMENT – on divers paying the price for their cheating!
A mere yellow card is a farce of course and there should be an automatic mandatory six match Prem ban for diving cheats AND DOUBLED EACH TIME THE PLAYER REPEATS IT IN THE FUTURE. PLUS A VERY HEAVY WAGES FINE.
That sort of cleansing punishment would wipe the cheats away and start a code of honesty, IF proper punishments for all cheating acts in all football situations were made mandatory and strictly enforced every time!
But they will NOT be, as there is not the will to do so, as we all know.
So this lone act of sporting behaviour when an injury occurs is frankly a mere sop to fool some dullards into believing the game is honest, while in fact it is as crooked with player cheating as it is possible to be and it stinks.
Ironically, many fans falsely and stupidly accuse refs of cheating, when in fact refs are the ONLY honest men on the pitch most of the time.
Refs are poor in standard mostly, but not cheats. BUT MOST PLAYERS ARE AND ARE MOST OF THE TIME WHEN IT SUITS THEIR TEAM.
There are many thugs in the epl. Pires on his baptism said the epl is a street fight. The physicality dished out could have seriously injured the gunners.
I have been saying the football authorities should punish some of these thuggish behaviour more severely. The std three game ban wont do. Make it a ten game ban.
If it were the old Arsenal, the gunners would have lost.
MA is more pragmatic. He is not interested in ballet soccer.He wants to win.
The guy was already up when Rose kicked it out. Jamie, stop this talk already . The ref could have stopped it if it’s the way you said it was .