Jamie Carragher has accused Arsenal of bending the rules amid accusations that Mikel Arteta’s team have been guilty of employing dark arts.
The Gunners came within a whisker of achieving an astonishing victory against Manchester City at the weekend, having been forced to play for nearly an hour with 10 men following the controversial dismissal of Leandro Trossard.
Ultimately, John Stones’ late, late goal earned a point for the champions but Arsenal will feel their title chances have been enhanced following a display of gritty resilience and defiance.
Rather than concentrate on the finer points of Arsenal’s defending, Arteta’s side have faced a tidal wave of criticism from pundits and fans alike who have accused them of achieving a positive result by any means possible.
Statistics released earlier this week revealed that Arsenal are indeed the Premier League’s biggest time wasters so far this season and Carragher believes, in a Jose Mourinho-esque fashion, they are exploring a loophole in a rule that forces the referee to stop a game should a goalkeeper go down with an injury.
‘When I mention the Morurinho thing, he was always ahead of the game in terms of trying to gain an advantage somewhere,’ Carragher told The Overlap.
‘There’s one thing I do notice Arsenal doing more than anyone. I don’t know if the stats back me up I think the goalkeeper goes down a lot more than other goalkeepers in tense situations.
‘The rule is a goalkeeper can’t go off so that’s definitely one that the coaching staff at Arsenal are more switched on about that anyone else. I see Raya go down in pressure situations.’
Guest presenter Paul Scholes chimed in and went a step further, and said: ‘Cheating that’s called isn’t it, Jamie?’
‘It is but you said it so you can have the headline not me,’ said Carragher in response.
Arsenal are back in action tonight against Bolton in the Carabao Cup ahead of which Arteta came out fighting in defence of his team and claimed he would have been stupid not to adjust his tactics and learn from previous chastening defeats at the hands of City in particular.
‘We learnt from the past. Unfortunately we’ve been in the same situation a few times.
‘We were in that same situation with Granit after 38 minutes and we lost 5-0.
‘We’d better learn. If not I would be thick, very thick.’
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