A seething Mikel Arteta admitted that he was “amazed about how inconsistent the decisions can be” after Declan Rice was sent off as Arsenal dropped their first points of the new season against Brighton.
Arsenal had looked on course to maintain their 100% start to the new campaign when Bukayo Saka pounced on a mistake by Lewis Dunk to set up Kai Havertz. But an incident early in the second half when Rice, who had never been sent off before in his career and will now miss the north London derby against Tottenham after the international break, was shown a second yellow card by referee Chris Kavanagh after being deemed to have obstructed Joël Veltman from taking a free-kick altered the momentum of the game entirely.
