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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Sport
Josh O'Brien

Arsene Wenger's Arsenal milestone ruined by ref blunder and finished by Mohamed Salah

Arsene Wenger's achievement of 1000 games at the helm of Arsenal is quite the feat, yet the day that saw him reach that mark in 2014 was one he'd sooner forget.

The Gunners made the short trip across London to take on a Chelsea side spearheaded by Wenger's greatest enemy of all - Jose Mourinho. The self-proclaimed 'special one' was in the middle of his second stint as Blues boss and was looking to inflict more misery on Wenger regardless of his special day and did so in emphatic fashion.

Barely 10 minutes had passed and Wenger already cut a miserable figure in the opposition technical area as goals from Samuel Eto'o and Andre Schurrle left Arsenal with a mountain to climb after just seven minutes on the clock. The travelling Gunners contingent would have feared the worst given this clash came just a month after their side were 4-0 down to Liverpool inside the opening half hour at Anfield in a tie they eventually lost 5-1.

The 2013/14 season saw the Gunners actually lead the league at one stage, but capitulations against sides around them quickly saw them fall out of a title race which was eventually contested by Liverpool and Manchester City. The kind of defending that leads you to being 2-0 down before some supporters have even taken their seats will ensure your title hopes are quashed rather quickly.

Just as Arsenal were coming to terms with the two sucker punches they had been dealt, one of the Premier League's most memorable red-cards occurred. Bizarre and controversial in equal measure, it is not a moment Andre Marriner will want reminding of.

Eden Hazard's strike appeared to be heading wide of Wojciech Szczesny's goal, but the eagle-eyed official spotted a handball thwarting the Belgian's effort. What Marriner hadn't seen, quite crucially, was who had done it. The referee reached for his back-pocket to dismiss Arsenal full-back Kieran Gibbs.

Referee Andre Marriner sent off the wrong player in a remarkable case of mistaken identity, sending Arsenal's Kieran Gibbs off instead of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (AFP/Getty)

HAVE YOUR SAY! Should Wenger have left Arsenal sooner than he did? Comment below

What was not made clear to Marriner until half-time at the earliest, despite protests from the players, was that it was actually Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain who had committed the offence. Wenger could only watch on as the madness unfolded, while a rather confused Gibbs trudged off the pitch actually avoiding the battering that was to come.

Hazard duly stepped up and converted the spot-kick and Arsenal found themselves both a man down and three goals down after 17 minutes. Brazilian midfielder Oscar netted a brace with each of his efforts coming either side of the interval to put Chelsea five goals to the good.

The sixth Blues goal was netted by what was then a much-maligned Mohamed Salah, struggling to get a game at Stamford Bridge - his strike the first of what was an underwhelming Chelsea career in which he only scored one more before fleeing to Serie A. He would of course return in the most spectacular fashion with Liverpool.

Salah's story is a separate one altogether and the immediate post-match discourse after this clash was whether Wenger would recover from such a drubbing. The build-up to the game focused almost solely on the Frenchman, who had remarked in his pre-match comments that every defeat leaves "a scar in your heart that you never forget".

It is not out of the question to suggest that this defeat in particular left the most painful scar, seeing as it came against a man Wenger had also lost his 500th game in charge of Arsenal to nine years prior. A man who had dubbed Wenger a "specialist in failure" just a month before this humiliating loss.

Former top-flight official Clive Thomas told BBC Radio Five Live that Marriner's red card for Gibbs was "the most disgusting, shocking decision" he'd ever seen, but Wenger's focus was on the result. "We got a good hiding today," admitted the Frenchman. To this day, that fateful afternoon at Stamford Bridge remains the second-heaviest defeat of Arsenal's Premier League history.

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