Mikel Arteta: Put My Positive VAR Comments Everywhere

By The Editor
on 11th November 2023

Mikel Arteta was eager to express his opinions on the officials…

Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta was eager to once again give his opinion on the officials after our 3-1 win against Burnley, this time deciding to praise their performance, BBC Sport reports.

Arteta has been in the news this week following last weekend’s defeat at St James’s Park with the Spaniard raging at the awarding of Newcastle United’s winner.

VAR checked the goal for three infringements, and on all occasions, went the way of the home side in what was a raucous atmosphere.

As the Gunners returned to winning ways, Michael Oliver had a good game in the middle with his one major decision coming by way of brandishing a red card for Fabio Vieira.

Arteta had no complaints – and nor could he after what was a pathetic challenge from the Portuguese midfielder.

“You have to ask me about VAR,” Arteta prompted the reporter.

“Yeah! It was perfect. The referee, the VAR, it was perfect.

“So don’t just ask me when I’m going to say something there. In front of the camera – put it everywhere like you did with the other one – the referee was top, VAR was top.

“Let’s have some humour and move forward.”

As ever with Arteta, I’m still not sure if he’s genuinely praising the officials or if he’s being sarcastic and is actually alluding to the opposite.

There wasn’t much to have a gripe with to be fair, apart from an interesting moment in Burnley’s penalty box.

The players thought they’d taken the leader after Jordan Beyer looped his header over goalkeeper James Trafford as he attempted to clear a Bukayo Saka header across goal.

However, Oliver blew his whistle and called a push by Saka on the defender before his header. Any onlooker can see that the contact from Saka was substantially softer than the one on Gabriel from Joelinton last week. Consistency, anyone?