Mikel Arteta feels the talk around the number of red cards Premier League referees have shown Arsenal is making the issue seem worse than reality, via quotes by football.london.
Top-flight officials have sent more Gunners players off over the past two-years since they hired Arteta than any other team. The Emirates Stadium natives have played with 10-men or fewer on 12 occasions, following Gabriel Martinelli’s red card at Wolves last time out.
Michael Olivier reached for his back pocket to show Martinelli a red after two yellow card offences at Molineux. The incidents occurred seconds apart with the same passage of play seeing the Brazilian collide with Daniel Podence before stopping Chiquinho breaking away.
Referees have now sent 12 Arsenal players off since Arteta’s debut in the dugout against Bournemouth in December 2019. Yet, per The Sun, the Gunners have also committed the second-fewest fouls with 785 over 79 games. So, are averaging a red for every 65.4 fouls.
Bournemouth have the second-worst average with a red card for every 98.5 fouls ahead of West Brom (101). Burnley, meanwhile, have committed 804 fouls over the same period as Arteta’s Arsenal tenure without seeing a single red card. But not all incidents are the same.
Arteta shares dream wish to solve troublesome Arsenal red card issue
Arteta has now shared his dream solution to Arsenal’s troublesome red card record – other than referees showing them fewer – would be for all talk surrounding their issue to reduce.
“Probably don’t talk about it no more,” Arteta said. “I think the more we talk about it, the worse we’re making it.”
Arteta also does not want to consider there being a stigma around Arsenal when it comes to red cards. The Spaniard added: “I don’t want to think like that.”
David Luiz (3), Granit Xhaka (2), Gabriel Magalhaes (2), Eddie Nketiah (1), Bernd Leno (1), Martinelli (1), Nicolas Pepe (1) and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (1) account for Arsenal’s Premier League red cards since hiring Arteta to replace Unai Emery at the helm in 2019.
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