Arsenal 2 Birmingham 1:WITH THE furore surrounding x-rated challenges how ironic that Arsenal, the flag-bearers for pure football, should find themselves forced to deny they are a "dirty" team, following this fractious encounter that was decided by a Marouane Chamakh second-half strike.
Jack Wilshere’s late sending off for a terrible tackle on Nikola Zigic means his club have the most red cards of any in the league (three), while Emmanuel Eboue and Samir Nasri were also accused by the Birmingham City defender Roger Johnson, and his manager, Alex McLeish, of engaging in the brutal stuff.
All this despite Arsene Wenger’s crusade to eradicate dangerous tackles. Before kick-off he had stated: “I am convinced everybody needs to fight against violence,” while the Frenchman described Stoke City’s approach against Tottenham Hotspur in August as being, “more rugby on the goalkeepers than football”.
This caused Tony Pulis, the Stoke City manager, to demand an apology, which so far has not been forthcoming. Wenger is also involved in a long running spat with Sam Allardyce that dates from when the Blackburn Rovers manager was in charge of Bolton Wanderers.
Asked if other managers might now relish the opportunity to point the finger back at Wenger he said: “You have to make a difference between an accidental red card (received by Wilshere) and a team who tries to kick you from the first to the last minute. There is no comparison.”
Step forward Johnson and McLeish to disagree. “The tackle by Nasri is a sending-off for me. He’s kneed the guy in the back – is that not violent conduct?”
McLeish asked of a challenge on Liam Ridgewell, which occurred after the Frenchman had cancelled out Zigic’s opener with a 41st-minute penalty won by Chamakh from a clash with Scott Dann. “Nasri should have been sent off, Eboue (also) had the scissor challenge on Ridgewell,” McLeish said.
While the reference to a scissor challenge might cause Wenger further discomfort – he also said before the game that precisely this type of tackle can “end careers” – Johnson was scathing about Wilshere. “It’s not dissimilar to the one on Eduardo (da Silva) by Martin Taylor (in 2008) – ankle height, (it) could have snapped his leg, thankfully it didn’t,” he said, before joining McLeish in pointing to Eboue’s challenge. “I thought the tackle was awful as well.”
McLeish concurred with Johnson regarding Wilshere. “I don’t want to get into a war of words with Arsene. I respect him,” he said. “But it was a bad tackle and he should be drawing a line under the Taylor one because he’s not a dirty player, either. He asked for Martin to be banned for life, but I think he later retracted those comments.”
Chamakh’s goal arrived after the French striker collected a delightful Wilshere pass, profited from a lucky bounce, weaved around the Birmingham goalkeeper Ben Foster and finished. Yet the 26-year-old, who now has five goals in 11 games, had to later defend Arsenal from that red-card tally and the charge Wenger’s pre-match comments might have proved a touch hypocritical. “No I don’t think we are dirty or too aggressive – it’s (the three red cards) happened so far but things are going to change throughout the season,” he claimed.
Zigic had earlier given the visitors the lead with a header from a Keith Fahey cross before Chamakh’s debatable winning of the penalty. Cue Johnson again. “It was the wrong decision, we all think it’s the wrong decision,” he said of the referee Martin Atkinson. “I’m sure Match of the Day, Sky, everyone will have a look and see for themselves.” As it turned out, the Match of the Day pundits concluded there was contact.
Dann also claimed there was no contact with Chamakh. “I definitely know I didn’t touch him. I said to him (Atkinson) after the game: ‘Do you really think it was a penalty?’ And he didn’t really say anything.” Chamakh disagreed. “He definitely touched me.”
Guardian Service
