Former Chelsea midfielder, John Obi Mikel, has launched a scathing attack on Arsenal, accusing the North London club of using “illegal” tactics and attempting to “cheat their way” to the Premier League title.
Mikel did not hold back during a recent punditry appearance, where he criticised the club for depending solely on corner kicks to win games.
According to Mikel, the Gunners have increasingly pushed the boundaries of the rules in their quest to win the Premier League.
Arsenal have scored 21 goals from set-pieces in the league this season, more than any other team.
According to their website, 35 of their 100 goals in all competitions have come from open play.
Mikel said: ‘When I watch Arsenal play right now, they depend solely, solely on corner kicks. You have spent almost a billion, Mikel Arteta, almost a billion. And you’re telling me the only way you can win games is through corner kicks? It’s ridiculous… they win it ugly.
‘The only reason why the Arsenal fans are not complaining with the style of football that they’re playing is because they’re top of the league. If they’re not top of the league, they will complain that they’re not enjoying the type of football that they’re playing. You look at the corner kicks, all them players.
‘It’s illegal… The creativity that they have, the potentials that they have, it’s all gone out of the window. We don’t see them anymore. The likes of Saka, the likes of Martinelli, the likes of Eze, Odegaard. We don’t see that anymore because they depend solely on corner kicks.
‘What is illegal about it? It’s for me, every time I watch them doing the corner kicks, doing set pieces, what they do during set-pieces, for me, it’s illegal. You can’t do that. First of all, they’re impeding the goalkeeper and now they start holding players.
‘When you hold a play, when you impede a player from jumping, I watched the game against Chelsea when they played against us. Declan Rice was grabbing, I don’t know who’s, the left back, what’s his name [Jorrel Hato]?
‘He was holding him so he couldn’t jump. And for me, yeah, and for me, how can the referee not see that? Even if the ball goes in, how can the VAR not see that? And for me, the PGMOL, well, they need to come out and they need to straight away, they need to stop this because if they don’t stop this, the whole bunch of teams are gonna start doing it.
‘And for me, that’s illegal. So that is what I mean, that Arsenal are trying to cheat their way to winning the Premier League. They’re trying to cheat their way to winning the Premier League.’
‘It’s week in, week out. You look at Gabriel, you look at Saliba, you look at Declan Rice, they are physically manhandling players, they’re holding players. You can’t do that. That is penalty. It doesn’t matter how much you look at it. The VAR can see that.
‘That’s a team that is desperate of winning the Premier League, because they know that they haven’t won the Premier League for the last 22 years, 23 years. And now they’re so desperate, they want to cheat their way through it. They want to take the ball and say, you know what, yeah, we finally won it.
‘Win it the right way, play the game the right way, and win the game the right way, which is legally. Then for me, week in, week out, when I see them do that, and the type of football that they’re playing as well, I’ve said it here. It’s not fun to watch; it’s so rigid. There’s no creativity.
‘For the past five, six weeks, we’ve seen Arsenal play horribly, and they’re winning.’
Arsenal are seven points ahead of Manchester City, having played a game more, and have eight matches left.
