London, Sep 24 (IANS): Five games into the new Premier League season and Arsenal have already had two players sent off after kicking the ball and delaying the restart.

Ahead of their games against Bolton Wanderer, Mikel Arteta was asked if he has now told the Gunners to not kick the ball away.

“For passing the ball you mean?. Just leave the ball, don’t touch the ball. We’ll play without the ball,” said Arteta in a pre-match press conference.

A lot of criticism has gone Arsenal’s way after the side were forced to defend deep inside their own box against Manchester City. The London based side were leading 2-1 when Trossard was sent off and almost managed to hold onto the lead but ended up conceding an equaliser in the dying embers of the game.

Arteta hit back on the criticism of his style of play and also referred to Arsenal’s game at the Etihad Stadium in 2021 when Granit Xhaka was sent off in the 34th minute of the game which the Gunners went on to lose 0-5.

“We had to play the game that we had to play. In the first 10 or 15 minutes we couldn’t. 11 against 11, then we got much better and obviously were thrown into a very different context. Every team does. We had to do it in a different way. We learned from the past as well because unfortunately we’ve been in that situation three times. One was with Granit after 37, 38 minutes and we conceded how many?,” he added.

After two consecutive draws, in the Champions League and Premier League, Arsenal’s attention draws towards the third round of the Carabao Cup where they will host Bolton Wanderers at the Emirates Stadium on Thursday (IST).

“We want to win the game tomorrow. We have to start with the first game. We have to understand what is the best team, the strongest team that we can put out to perform in the way that we need to to be better than Bolton and beat them.