Richard Keys tears into Howard Webb after seeing what he did when William Saliba was sent off for Arsenal

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Although Arsenal will have William Saliba available against Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League, the Frenchman won't face Liverpool next weekend. 

Saliba picked up a one-game domestic suspension for his red card in Arsenal's 2-0 defeat against Bournemouth on Saturday.

The defender made a poor split-second decision to pull Bournemouth's Evanilson down once he was through on goal owing to Leandro Trossard's errand pass.

Saliba made the wrong call, but Arsenal fans will forgive the centre-back for one lapse piece of judgement across two flawless seasons.


Of course, VAR's decision to upgrade the on-field decision to hand Saliba a yellow card was put under fresh scrutiny once Chelsea's Tosin Adarabioyo was sent off for a similar foul against Liverpool.

Richard Keys can understand why Arsenal fans are furious right now

That being said, Richard Keys shared his thoughts on the situation on his blog and took at PGMOL chief Howard Webb who was actually in attendance at Arsenal's defeat to Bournemouth.

The cameras at the game panned to Webb during VAR's check on Saliba's red card, and the former Premier League ref was busy on his phone, leading to all kinds of speculation.

Photo by Robin Jones – AFC Bournemouth/AFC Bournemouth via Getty Images

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And to that end, Keys had his say: "I can understand why Arsenal fans were furious that Chelsea's Tosin wasn't sent-off in a replica of the incident that saw Saliba dismissed the previous day. Perhaps the difference was that Howard Webb wasn't at the game?

“The PGMOL tell us that Webb had nothing to do with Saliba's sending off so we must believe them. But who was he texting? Was he ordering pizza? A car home? Dinner somewhere? We'll never know.

"What I do know is that it wasn't a good look to get caught on the phone at that moment.”

Howard Webb isn’t to blame for William Saliba’s red card

Arsenal fans are feeling incredibly hard done by right now, after all, that dismissal made it three reds in just eight games – crazy numbers.

Mikel Arteta must be endlessly frustrated that his team have now surrendered seven Premier League points when down to 10-men, they haven't won any of the three games when they've lost a player.

And perhaps some may agree with some of Keys' thoughts, even if they are incredibly speculative.

Ultimately, all Arsenal can do is attempt to stop the referee from having a possibility of changing the course of their performance.

Declan Rice, Leandro Trossard and Saliba all gave the referee a decision to make, even if the outcome was still surprising in at least two of those scenarios.

A difficult period for the Gunners, but definitely one they can bounce back from.

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