A Premier League match between Stoke City and Arsenal turning nasty – now where have we heard this before?
Top-flight meetings between the two sides in recent years have brought red cards, fierce tackles and bad blood between managers, and the latest encounter had at least one of the three.
Arsenal’s Granit Xhaka was considered by some to be lucky to stay on the pitch, but he wasn’t the only one.
Xhaka’s apparent elbow on Joe Allen was enough to see Stoke awarded a penalty – from which Charlie Adam opened the scoring – but Adam himself was in the thick of things later on in the game.
In the build-up to Arsenal’s third goal in their 3-1 win, Adam seemed to leave a boot in on Arsenal’s Alexis Sánchez in an incident which seemed to be missed by referee Lee Mason.
Eagle-eyed fans spotted it, though, and soon we all became aware.
Hard to pinpoint a more consistently violent player than @Charlie26Adam in the league. pic.twitter.com/tYEI1I1LIJ
— Tim Stillman (@Stillmanator) December 10, 2016
Just seen Charlie Adam stamp on a prone Alexis. Thuggery, and frustration that he can't touch him on a talent basis.
— JokAFC (@JokmanAFC) December 10, 2016
Charlie Adam actually had a small chance to make a challenge on Iwobi but chose to delay his run and stamp on Sanchez instead
— Steve Barry (@SteveBarry8) December 10, 2016
A referee missing a stamp is one thing, but fans pre-empting a conspiracy? That’s a new one.
Death & taxes are 2 of life's certainties. So is no FA action following Charlie Adam's deliberate stamp on Alexis.
Bet MOTD edit it out too
— Steve 🔴⚪️ (@YorksGooner) December 10, 2016
https://twitter.com/whatgap/status/807704509422170112
Charlie Adam is on MOTD sometimes they won't say nowt
— tosin (@TosinAFC) December 10, 2016
Adam, who turned 31 today, might have been on the scoresheet but he wasn’t on the winning side. And things could yet get a whole lot worse for the Scot.
The defeat leaves Stoke 10th in the Premier League, while Arsenal – at least temporarily – went top with the win.
Catch up with this week’s episode of Football Friday Live
