Mikel Arteta has shrugged off suggestions that he gave Leandro Trossard a punishment for his red card against Manchester City. The 29-year-old winger was given his marching orders shortly before half-time during the Premier League title showdown clash last weekend.
Trossard was dismissed after delaying the restart following a foul on Bernardo Silva. It was the second time the Gunners have had a player sent off for kicking the ball away this season; Declan Rice was shown a second yellow card in a 1-1 draw against Brighton.
While the incident raised a few eyebrows, the Key Match Incidents panel, who review every referee decision in the Premier League each week, adjudged Michael Oliver to have made the correct call. An official statement read: "Trossard clearly delays the restart by kicking the ball away."
The view was not unanimous, though, with one panellist claiming the 'split-second nature of the kick away was enough of a mitigating factor'. Nevertheless, Trossard was given a one-match ban, which he served during Arsenal's 5-1 win over Bolton Wanderers in the Carabao Cup third round on Wednesday night.
On Thursday, after serving his suspension, a video emerged of the Belgium international carrying two heavy ice coolers as he walked into London Colney. Then, when speaking to reporters on Friday ahead of the Leicester City clash, Arteta was asked if there was any truth behind the 'punishment' rumours.
"I haven't seen that [video]," said the Spaniard after pulling a confused face. "No, I haven't seen that. This is not an apology that I made him do, so I don't know what you're talking about."
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Later in the press conference, Arteta was asked if he's been surprised that his team are being criticised given their results. The Arsenal boss said: "I don’t know but honestly it’s part of what we do, because I don’t want to be on YouTube because we’ve been so silly.
"I want to be on YouTube because we’ve done the right thing in May, and for the right reasons and lifting what we want to lift and achieve, so in order to do that we have to be very efficient in what we do.
"So I didn’t predict to play 66 minutes with 10 men, and we had to do that, and we have to accept that. And sometimes the opponent is better at doing something in the game.
"That doesn’t mean they are playing better, they are being better at doing a specific thing inside the game. We are interested in doing all the things that can help us to win the game."
