Wenger Hits Out At Costa

The win helped Chelsea remain unbeaten since Guus Hiddink replaced Jose Mourinho and has not lost in its last nine league meetings with Arsenal.

Arsenal dropped from first to third place this weekend, behind leader Leicester and Manchester City, although there are 45 points still to play for. “I hope this will give us a confidence boost, we have the FA Cup on Sunday and the Champions League is coming up as well”.

“Mertesacker made the challenge but I said he got Mertesacker sent off, you can not say it’s not true”, Wenger claimed. Those are only facts. Was the decision right or wrong? “Fact is a fact – I do not accuse him of anything, it is just what happened”. “The team were focused and resilient, fighting to the last second”.

“What we take from today is that we are disappointed, but have a lot of positives from our attitude and spirit”.

“There was no doubt”, said Hiddink. “You could see it was a handsome through pass and Diego could run straight through to Petr Cech but was tripped”.

But for once it wasn’t a confrontation or a dirty action, as the Spain global got in front of Per Mertesacker and was fouled by the defender… resulting in a red card.

“I like to see them play, but our credit was not to have them play”, he added. And Chelsea proved that once again when they emerged as 1-0 winners at the Emirates against 10-man Gunners. “Normally you lose a game like that 3-0 or 4-0”, he told reporters. The fourth Champions League place, 14 points away, looks unobtainable.

“Anything is possible”, Terry said. “Anything is doable. Everybody is beating everybody else”. That’s a regret, that the team put in so much energy and we come out without any point. “But when the captain is saying that I will follow my captain”. With that gap, it’s hard to go into fourth.

“This was the real Chelsea, and I believe that we can show again in the future that we deserve to play for this club”, Matic said.

However, Hill-Wood has taken it a step further and launched a scathing attack on the former Atletico Madrid star and accused him of getting Mertesacker sent off by feigning injury.