Arsenal's frustration with PGMOL and Premier League referees continued after Jarred Gillett denied Kai Havertz's injury-time goal in the 1-0 Premier League defeat to Aston Villa.
The Gunners suffered only their second defeat of the season at Villa Park after John McGinn’s early strike continued Unai Emery’s fantastic turnaround at Aston Villa.
Speaking to the media after the match, Arteta recalled his disappointment with the result,
“I’m very disappointed with the result, especially with the way we played, I think we deserved much more than what we had, I thought we were the better team, I haven’t seen a team do what we did to Villa today since we were here in February,” Mikel Arteta said.
“It wasn’t enough to win it because we lacked the accuracy in the opponent’s box to put the ball in the back of the net with the amount of situations that we generated.”
Like the narrow loss at Newcastle last month, the defeat at Villa was overshadowed by a number of controversial calls from the officials.
Arsenal’s target Douglas Luiz escaped conceding a penalty for a foul on Gabriel Jesus before Havertz saw his late equaliser disallowed for handball.
However, supporters haven’t held back on their criticism of Referee Gillett’s decision, with some believing they have identified the reason why the goal was disallowed.
Gillett is a Liverpool fan and coincidentally Liverpool replaced Arsenal at the top of the Premier League over the weekend.
Fox Sports commentator Brenton Speed revealed Gillett’s allegiance in 2019, claiming he isn’t allowed to referee Liverpool games.
“He told me about this a couple of months ago, said keep it under your hat because I’m not sure whether I’ll get the appointment,” Speed said on the Fox Football Podcast.
“That’ll be the last game he ever officiates at Anfield because he had to fill out a document when he agreed to join the referees’ board over there and you have to fill in the team you supported as a boy/man and he said it was Liverpool.”
“So that means your taken off all their games, home or away.”
And it’s fair to say the referee’s loyalty to Liverpool has been questioned following his decisions at Villa Park.
This is not the first time Jarred Gillet faces controversy while involved in an Arsenal game as he was the VAR in charge of Arsenal’s 2:1 loss to Manchester City.
Mikel Arteta since has been cleared by FA Commission over post-match comments following Arsenal’s defeat to Newcastle United on November 4.
