Manchester United played the last 16 minutes, plus injury time, down a man but still emerged 3-1 winners at Arsenal today. This was mainly due to an out of this world performance from David de Gea. For United manager Jose Mourinho it was his first away win against a top six side during his Old Trafford tenure, and thus cause for celebration. After the match though Mourinho was not all puppy dogs and rainbows.
He hit out at his opponent, accusing them of diving, in a witty manner. He took a blatant swipe at Laurent Koscielny, and made a back-handed compliment as a way to slam the way Arsenal handled the news surrounding striker Alexandre Lacazette.
On the flip side of course, Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger was extremely critical of the officiating.
First, on Arsenal players diving in attempt to win penalty kicks.
“Look if it is not a penalty, it is not a penalty,” Mourinho said. I know the pitch is amazing and maybe it creates a desire to go to the floor. If it was hard, no. If it was mud, no. But the pitch is absolutely beautiful. I think they were a bit too much.”
Next, Mourinho pointed out how his arch-rival Arsene Wenger declared Lacazette, his leading scorer, completely out for this game. Yet Lacazette played the full 90 minutes and scored the Gunners only goal.
“I don’t want to forget my congratulations to both medical departments,” Mourinho said.
“My medical department managed to recover [Nemanja] Matic from a maybe to a yes. But Arsenal’s medical department managed to recover a player from a no to a complete 90. Amazing. I congratulate them all.”
The final target in the cross-hairs of Mourinho was Laurent Koscielny, French national teammate of Paul Pogba. Mourinho took issue with Koscielny over the manner in which he reacted to attempting to get Pogba sent off following a challenge on Hector Bellerin that earned him a straight red, sent off and now out for the Manchester Derby next weekend.
He also said that Pogba was not happy with how Koscielny reacted.
“The red card, I didn’t see,” Mourinho said.
“I was not even looking in that direction. No television yet for me. I know that Paul is frustrated.
“A bit disappointed with his colleague Koscielny with this kind of reaction.”
“Paul is frustrated because everybody knows that Paul is a clean player and it was not his intention, not at all, to be close to a red card.”
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes regularly to WGN CLTV and the Tribune company’s blogging community Chicago Now.
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