Unai Emery was left raging by his own goalkeeper as Arsenal secured a dramatic comeback win over Aston Villa on Saturday.
Villa were on course for at least a point against the title challengers after first-half goals from Ollie Watkins and Philippe Coutinho. Villa keeper Emiliano Martinez had time-wasted for much of the game, leading to referee Simon Hooper adding on six minutes of injury time at the end of the match.
Four minutes into that added time, Jorginho sent a shot crashing off the bar, before it hit the luckless Martinez and bounced in. Soon after, Villa won a corner, with Martinez taking it upon himself to go forward in search of an equaliser.
But Arsenal counter-attacked from that set-piece and with Martinez stranded in the Gunners' half, Gabriel Martinelli raced away to tap the ball into an empty net and secure the win for the visitors.
Martinez's actions for that final goal has left Emery furious, with the Spaniard slamming his goalkeeper during his post-match media duties. The Villa boss revealed he had not told Martinez to go forward and the keeper had taken the decision by himself.
“I have never told my goalkeeper to go and score one goal in the 90th minute, because maybe – and I don’t know the data – maybe one goal in 100, maybe 20 times they [the opponents] are doing a counter transition and they are scoring 10 goals," he told BT Sport.
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"Today, it happened. And for me it’s not being very smart, not being very consistent in how we want to play, how we want to compete. We can play, we can lose 2-3, but 2-4? It’s not a good result.”
His anger did not die down, with Emery further lashing out at Martinez and labelling Arsenal's fourth goal "embarrassing". He insisted that Martinez now understood the rules he wanted to lay down to his team.
"Today I am very disappointed and it is embarrassing for me, the last goal. Because I never told my goalkeeper to go to a corner to score a goal. It is not the spirit, we have to keep our mind clear and smart," he added to BBC Sport.
"We have to progress in the way that we are working. We have to take confidence of course, but sometimes making mistakes you have to improve. We were very happy with how the team worked and prepared for the match.
"But then on the pitch after scoring first we were thinking when will the match finish. You have to play 90 minutes. I never told my goalkeeper to do it. But today he decided it was his decision.
"He was not doing something about my decision because I didn't tell him, but now he knows. He knows now."
