Arsenal news: Mikel Arteta guilty of breaking law as controversial footage analysed – Ex-Premier League referee
Arsenal should have seen their third goal in their 3-1 win over Watford yesterday (6 March) disallowed, according to Keith Hackett.
Speaking exclusively to Football Insider, the ex-Fifa and Premier League referee claimed Mikel Arteta broke the laws of the game when he left his technical area to retrieve the ball and start his side’s attack.
The ball ran out of play and Arteta ran from his technical area to pick it up and hand the ball to Bukayo Saka who took the throw in to start an attack.
Gabriel Martinelli eventually finished the move off to put his side comfortably 3-1 up.
“If you look at that clip, the technical area is one metre each side of the bench,” Hackett said after analysing the footage with Football Insider‘s Connor Whitley.
“You can see Arteta, when he throws the ball, there’s no question he is well outside his technical area. In law, that is an offence.
“He’s well outside his technical area. I pose the question, who is in charge of the referees at the elite end in England, is it the Premier League who have a former director Mike Foster as chairman of the PGMOL?
“This is slack refereeing. He’s left his technical area and got away with it.
“There is an issue with managing the managers in their technical area. This is the law. Are the referees going to apply the law?
“At the moment they are not so we see these types of situations. In Europe, when they referee European games they apply it rigidly. That tells you something.
“What he did was broke the laws of the game, no question. But he’s not alone.
“It’s both the referee and the fourth official. His team, on this occasion, have gained an unfair advantage.
“You’re often accused of being pedantic and people say it’s a little thing but have we got a law and are we going to apply it or not?
“I thought it was poor officiating.”
In other news, Kieran Maguire has questioned if Arsenal are a ‘big-six’ club anymore after a £238m announcement.