Manager may have sought an edge with his fume after first-leg draw but Champions League semi remains in balance

Mikel Arteta has felt the walls closing in on the domestic front in recent weeks. And it was surely a part of the reason why the Arsenal manager went on the offensive about refereeing decisions after his team’s Premier League win over Newcastle on Saturday .

Arteta insisted that the Newcastle goalkeeper, Nick Pope, ought to have been sent off rather than booked for a foul on Viktor Gyökeres, which he argued represented the denial of a goalscoring opportunity. And, while he was at it, Arteta went back to the previous league game – the 2-1 defeat at Manchester City – and made a similar point: he believed the City defender Abdukodir Khusanov should have been dismissed for a last-man foul on Kai Havertz.