Jamie Vardy caught Gunners defender Shkodran Mustafi on the cheek with the heel of his boot and Arsenal fans want the Leicester City forward banned.
The 33-year-old scored his 100th Premier League goal at the Emirates Stadium on Tuesday and took his tally at the top of this season’s goalscoring charts to 22, two ahead of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
Yet, the Leicester City legend isn’t making the news this morning for his incredible achievement but is rather being labelled as a cheater by Arsenal fans, who are fed up with refereeing inconsistencies.
Promising youngster Eddie Nketiah was red-carded for his dangerous challenge on James Justin a mere four minutes after he was introduced in place of French forward Alexandre Lacazette.
Arsenal fans dropped two points on Tuesday evening and wasted the golden opportunity to go above Wolves in the table and within three points of Manchester United, who have a game in hand on the North Londoners.
After replays of Vardy’s challenge on Mustafi appeared after the game, Arsenal fans realised how poor the Englishman’s foul really was and are now appealing for the FA to take retrospective action.
Here are a few fans venting their frustration on Twitter.
The logic used was Nketiah didn’t mean it so he shouldn’t have been sent off. Jamie Vardy probably didn’t mean this but he still did it. Booted Mustafi in the head. Not even looked at by Chris Kavanagh who shouldn’t be a professional referee the moron. pic.twitter.com/hq6CHG5IHG
— TikiTakaConnor (@TikiTakaConnor) July 7, 2020
Arteta saying on Sky that if Nketiah was a red, Vardy should have been sent off for the boot to Mustafi’s face at the end of the first half.
— arseblog (@arseblog) July 7, 2020
Vardy checks where Mustafi is and swings his leg – this is criminal pic.twitter.com/mYrw5i1s3F
— Link Up Arsenal (@LinkUpArsenal) July 7, 2020
The more you look at the above replay, the more Vardy’s leg movement seems unnatural and intentional.
The 33-year-old falls toward the ground and has a glance to see where Mustafi is and then seems to aim his boot at his chin.
Based purely on that clip, it seems likely Vardy will be hit with a ban but given the state of refereeing in England, it wouldn’t come as a major surprise if the forward somehow escaped any retribution.
