Sam Allardyce slams Arsene Wenger
Blackburn Rovers boss Sam Allardyce has slammed his Arsenal counterpart Arsene Wenger, suggesting that the Frenchman manipulates the media to influence referees and make his players untouchable.
Wenger made a point after the 4-1 win over Bolton Wanderers at the weekend to speak out over heavy challenges made to his players. The match saw central midfielder Abou Diaby pick up an injury to his ankle
following a tackle by left-back Paul Robinson.
Though the club cannot give a firm return date for the player, he missed last night’s 6-1 win over Braga in the opening UEFA Champions League group stage match and will also be ruled out of the English
Premier League game away to Sunderland on Saturday.
As a result, Wenger told Arsenal’s official match day programme yesterday that: "I have since seen the challenge on Abou Diaby again, and it should have been a straight red card. I like commitment, I like
heavy challenges and what I really don’t like is players who aren’t fully committed. But the intention has to be right," suggesting the Diaby challenge had an intent to injure.
Those words, however, incensed Allardyce, who claimed that Wenger was a master at using the media for his own purposes.
'Wenger has media in his pocket'
He told reporters that: "Arsene has most of the media in his pocket now and is almost— almost — affecting the officials so that you can't tackle an Arsenal player. That's something he's very clever at
working on and it's almost working in his favour. He's a very clever man in terms of influencing referees, officials and everybody in football."
Allardyce added that Wenger appeared to subtly attacking Blackburn’s brand of football and insisted that his players do not go out to deliberately injure opponents.
He said that: “There is a perception that we kick everybody and Arsenal's motivation is that you can't tackle (them) as you aren't supposed to. I completely deny that my team deliberately injures players.
In the Premier League the commitment and speed unfortunately brings players together at such pace that it's almost impossible to avoid injuries."
Tags: