Mikel Arteta sends strong warning to Arsenal over red card woes

William Saliba became the third Arsenal player to be sent off this season when he dragged down Evanilson in the 2-0 defeat to Bournemouth, after both Declan Rice and Leandro Trossard had been shown second yellow cards for delaying the restart earlier this season.

Since Arteta first took charge of Arsenal in December 2019, the Gunners have been shown a total of 18 red cards. No other Premier League team has been shown more than 13 in that time.

The latest red cards came in the only three games Arsenal have failed to win so far this year, and Arteta has acknowledged that his side will not be able to compete for the Premier League title if they continue to sabotage themselves.

"Playing with ten men, obviously there is an issue," he told a press conference. "The truth is when you analyse the three very different actions and the outcome of them, the reasons are very different.

"Regardless of that, we cannot continue to play with ten men, especially at this level. And you see how struggling, all the teams have to win football matches. When you want to do it against ten men for 65 minutes, the task becomes almost impossible. So, we need to eradicate that. It's clear why, the reason and how, it doesn't matter. We have to focus and it has to happen."

Rejecting claims that Arsenal are too aggressive under his watch, Arteta admitted the players need to change something about their approach to games.

"Well I think for example what happened in those three cases has nothing to do with aggression in my opinion," he stressed. "But yeah, everybody has got his own opinion. We want to be super competitive when we are and we show that it's great. When you show it and it doesn't go your way and you lose, it's something else, it's part of the judgement."

Saliba is available for Tuesday's Champions League clash with Shakhtar Donetsk but will miss next weekend's huge clash with Liverpool at the Emirates Stadium - the result of a one-match suspension rather than the three-match ban that accompanies a red card for violent conduct.