Morning all.
What could and should have been a great game was once again ruined by dreadful officiating. Tierney had the opportunity to show he was a better referee than those who’ve been heavily criticised after the Saturday matches. The same applies to VAR.
McTominay should have been booked after dangerously shoving Gabriel Martinelli in the back. Play on he said and yet when Odegaard barely touched Eriksen, it was deemed bad enough to disallow what was a superb goal from Martinelli to give us the lead. Gabriel Jesus was pulled, pushed, had his shirt pulled and was manhandled by Varane and yet, nothing given. We weren’t getting anything from that game regardless of how well we played and we did play very well.
At 2-1 down, Mikel Arteta made three attacking changes for Odegaard, Lokonga and Zinchenko. Utd said thank you very much and scored again. With nothing to lose, we didn’t stop attacking but to no avail. Mikel Arteta and his team were beaten for the first time this season.
The chance of Arsenal winning at Old Trafford was about as slim as Sam Ryder winning The Eurovision Song Contest this year. He could have sung the greatest song ever produced but the Ukraine were always going to win, even before the first note had been struck or the first lyric sung. In my opinion, Arsenal were the better team, yet Riley, Tierney and VAR were never going to let us win.
Post match on Sky Sports, Mikel Arteta said:
It’s a lack of consistency. What is soft? Last week, they [Aston Villa] got a goal when there’s a foul on Aaron (Ramsdale), but it’s soft and it’s not a foul. Then there’s a penalty on Bukayo [Saka, by Tyrone Mings] but it’s soft and not a penalty. Today this is a foul. There were some strong tackles and no yellow cards because the threshold is low because it’s a big game. It’s really difficult to accept.
If Man Utd had beaten us fair and square then fine, well done to them but they didn’t and that sticks in my throat. This weekend has highlighted just how bad the officials in this country are. How inconsistent they are too. Sky Sports and football in general loves to see a new world record transfer window of spending but football, or rather the PGMOL are costing clubs points which in turn means money come the end of the season. Its ridiculous and so bleedin obvious, I can’t see how the errors being made from one game to the next can simply be someone is having an off day.
As Mikel Arteta said, what is soft? What is a foul and what is not? If the officials don’t even know, or dare I say make their own minds up depending on who’s playing who, then football will never be fair.
Football needs VAR, it needs technology, but what it doesn’t need is ex referees who were terrible at their job on the pitch, officiating the game off it.
Yep, I’m utterly cheesed off because yet again, we’ve been stitched up at Old Trafford…
See you in the comments.
Morning Rico
Annoying result, but not unexpected. We have always struggled at OT. The VAR call was nonsense. If the goal stands the game changes dramatically.
Jesus, Martinelli and Saka gave the United defence a real working over, but we didn’t have a lot of shots at goal.
United were forced into sitting back and playing the counter attack at home. It worked, but it was mainly due to the naivete of our defending. Making Rashford look a decent player is quite an achievement.
Overall we were far and away the better side. Very encouraging, but we need to iron out the defensive errors and stop shooting ourselves in the foot.
At times I recon the officials are deliberately messing every think up as a silent protest against VAR, but all VAR has shown is how bad the referring is.
Interesting that when Arsenal are on the receiving end of poor officiating that nobody in the media gives a toss, but it happens to Newcastle and media darlings West Ham and suddenly Mike Riley isn’t fit for purpose. No shit Sherlock he’s not been fit for purpose for years but you cowards have said fcuk all.
Morning Pete. I agree re the game had we been given the goal. Very different result imo.
I see Keane is saying Arteta is a moaner, what a turd that guy is.
I think it’s well accepted that Riley did not want it . I seem to remember that as it was introduced throughout Europe Riley delayed it’s start . I think he set out a policy to make it as farcical as he could in the hope that the outcry would be so loud that it would be scrapped. I have friends abroad that watch VAR in action and they don’t have the slide rule minutiae that Riley employs and it seems to work without the welter of incidents that keep the red tops and Sky and it’s acolytes in business.
As for yesterday , in retrospect at 1-1 we should have settled for the point instead of going for a win and naively getting caught . The three subs at once destroyed the pattern.
I understand why Arteta went for the goal though as I think we were 2-1 down at the time. But, the changes were always likely to cause problems defensively as we lost both Zinchenko and Lokonga.
Once it was confirmed who was the ref that was going to stitch us up this time( Salford) & Var ( greater Manchester) I didn’t bother watching.For I already knew the script.At least one game changing decision to go against us at a crucial time.It arrived with Martinelli.Allowed Manure to sit back & counter.All their good at.Allowed McTominay to once again get away with serial fouling( someone has posted a match compilation of his handy work) Allowed that redneck prick Keane to show his complete biasness after.What’s the point of punditry?Might as well listen to the manure fans commentary.
The more i think about it ,it begs the question . Who is the senior referee ? Is he on the pitch or in a cabin somewhere near London Airport .
Positive Pete, I thought the same as you. Just like the 50th game, stitched up like a kipper.
Somewhere opening a brown envelope perhaps…
Riley’ probably on a private yacht with Fergi celebrating Man U win
I accept that it may have been Odegard’s fault, but there are more mistakes, always against the same ones: the goal validated by Aston Villa, fouls and cards scored with 2 criteria, etc. In addition to the focus, I wonder how Lisandro doesn’t get a yellow card right away on Arsenal’s first move. They were quick to show it to Saliba (well shown) but why didn’t they show it to Lisandro? Was it because in one case it was the 1st move and in another it was over 15 minutes?
Fortunes are spent on VAR, so that later the criteria remain personal
Exactly Jm, it’s not the technology, it’s the operators of it. Even if that was a foul by Odegaard and it probably was, there were little grounds for VAR to get involved. The clear and obvious was not there. Why can’t officials be stronger and stick with their original decision instead of going to the monitor and nearly always change their mind.
It’s no use talking about VAR as the one’s in charge don’t care what the fans say, and certain players always get away with everything.
New post up now