{"id":329474,"date":"2026-03-05T02:25:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T02:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/329474\/"},"modified":"2026-03-05T02:25:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T02:25:08","slug":"only-one-team-tried-to-play-hurzeler-hits-out-at-arsenal-after-win-at-brighton-brighton-hove-albion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/329474\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Only one team tried to play\u2019: H\u00fcrzeler hits out at Arsenal after win at Brighton | Brighton & Hove Albion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fabian H\u00fcrzeler accused Arsenal<\/a> of playing by their own rules in a void left by weak Premier League refereeing in a furious broadside at their approach. The Brighton manager boiled over after his team lost 1-0 at home to them on Wednesday night, Bukayo Saka\u2019s early goal moving Arsenal seven points clear at the top of the table.<\/p>\n

H\u00fcrzeler had called out Mikel Arteta<\/a> for Arsenal\u2019s time-wasting beforehand and he did not hold back after witnessing a game in which he said there was \u201conly one team who tried to play football\u201d. He raged about how the Arsenal goalkeeper, David Raya, went down injured three times and insisted the authorities had to have stronger rules to help referees or the future of the game would be undermined.<\/p>\n

Arteta was keener to focus on a vital victory, which looked even better after Manchester City could only draw 2-2<\/a> at home against Nottingham Forest. But he did make a number of terse replies to H\u00fcrzeler\u2019s criticisms.<\/p>\n

\u201cI ask you one question,\u201d H\u00fcrzeler said. \u201cDid you see in a Premier League game a goalkeeper going down three times? You can\u2019t control these kind of things \u2026 therefore the Premier League has to find a rule. I made my point before the game and I stick to it. In the end I think [against] these kind of opponents, you can only punish [them] by winning so today I have no arguments on my side. If I would have a 2-1 win, a deserved 2-1 win, I could speak differently.\u201d<\/p>\n

H\u00fcrzeler was asked whether the ends justified the means for Arsenal. \u201cBut that\u2019s what I mean \u2026 [it is] a different kind of winning,\u201d he said. \u201cIf they win the Premier League, no one will ask how they win the Premier League. You can really feel that they do everything now to win and, in the end, it\u2019s about the rules. So if the Premier League, if the referee, allows everything, then it\u2019s difficult. Then, they make their own rules. At the moment, I have the feeling they are doing their own rules, no matter how they are playing.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will never be that kind of manager who tries to win in that way. Of course, every team will manage and waste time but there has to be a limit and the limit has to be set by the Premier League. The limit has to be set by the referees. At the moment, they [Arsenal] just do what they want.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere will this go in the future? That\u2019s my question. In one game, you play 60 minutes net and then when you play against Arsenal it\u2019s only 50 minutes. It\u2019s 10 minutes different and this is what the supporters are paying for. If I would ask everyone in the room: \u2018Did you really enjoy this football game?\u2019 I\u2019m sure maybe one raises his arm because he\u2019s a big Arsenal fan but, besides that, no chance.\u201d<\/p>\n

H\u00fcrzeler\u2019s comments were put to Arteta. \u201cWhat a surprise,\u201d the Arsenal manager said. \u201cYou just go back to the previous games [between Brighton and Arsenal] and you\u2019ll find a lot of comments like this always.\u201d Arteta was asked whether he cared about what other managers said about him. \u201cYeah \u2026 depends,\u201d he said. \u201cOn the manager? Yeah. And the comments. And the purpose of that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fabian H\u00fcrzeler accused Arsenal of playing by their own rules in a void left by weak Premier League…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":329475,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":["post-329474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=329474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/329475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=329474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=329474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=329474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}