Birmingham City 1, Arsenal 2

Posted Sunday, October 17, 2010 by YAHOO Sport

By NEIL RICHARDS STATS European Football Writer=

LONDON (SE) - Arsene Wenger celebrated his 800th game in charge of Arsenal with a victory as his ten-man Gunners came from a goal down to beat Birmingham 2-1 in a controversial match at the Emirates Stadium.

The equalising Arsenal penalty from Samir Nasri just before half-time was awarded for what seemed like a dive by Marouane Chamakh over the outstretched leg of Birmingham defender Scott Dann.

Blues, who had won only one game in the league this season, took a shock lead after 33 minutes. Keith Fahey delivered an accurate cross from the left and Nikola Zigic capped his first Premier League start by rising to plant a fine angled header past Lukasz Fabianski.

But once they had found a way to haul themselves level there was little doubt the home side would find a way to make their possession pay. The winner came two minutes into the second half, with Chamakh collecting a pass from Jack Wilshere and slotting past Ben Foster from a narrow angle.

Wenger, who in his programme notes had called for referees to punish bad tackles, got his wish as his own midfielder Wilshere was shown a straight red card three minutes into stoppage time for a lunging challenge on Zigic.

“There was not any intention to harm the player,” Wenger said. “He wanted to go for the ball but he mistimed his tackle and unfortunately got the red card and we do not complain about it.”

Birmingham manager Alex McLeish added: “For me what it does do is show that even great players can make bad tackles but it doesn’t mean that every player should be vilified for the tackle he makes.

“For me that should draw a line under the Martin Taylor tackle on Eduardo a couple of years ago (The Arsenal player suffered a badly broken leg at St Andrew’s in February 2008 after a challenge by the Birmingham defender).

“For weeks we bleated on about how innocent Martin was because he’s not a nasty player. Hopefully now people can realise that even the best players can mistime tackles.”

Having suffered successive league defeats going into the international break, there was some pressure on Arsenal to deliver in front of their increasingly-frustrated supporters.

The Londoners made their typically-fluent start with Chamakh denied by a goal by a sprawling challenge by Stephen Carr after a superb passing exchange between the Moroccan and Wilshere.

Sebastien Squillaci had a goal disallowed because he was fractionally offside when he met Nasri’s free-kick with a header and Foster saved at Andrey Arshavin’s feet after the Russian had been put through by the lively Diaby.

Clichy spurned the chance of netting just his second career goal, shooting wide after being gifted the ball by former team-mate Sebastian Larsson before Birmingham took the lead.

Zigic, with a considerable height advantage, outjumped Clichy and planted a header inside the far post beyond Lukasz Fabianksi.

Birmingham felt extremely hard done by with the Arsenal equaliser four minutes before the interval. Chamakh, who had fallen theatrically just minutes earlier, tumbled again in the area under Dann’s challenge and his team-mates looked almost embarrassed when referee Martin Atkinson pointed to the spot from where Nasri sent Foster the wrong way.

Wenger saw the penalty incident differently from many inside the Emirates. He said: “I thought it was a penalty, he (Chamakh) had no reason to go down. If he had not given the penalty we still would have had a good opportunity to score.”

McLeish said: “I thought Chamakh was cute, if I am honest. The players were raging, they felt he dived.

“I know Arsene felt it was a penalty, but he’s wearing the Arsenal tinted glasses, I’m wearing the Birmingham tinted glasses.”

Any half-time words of wisdom from McLeish were undone inside the first two minutes of the restart as Chamakh netted his fifth of the season after less than impressive efforts from Carr to halt his progress.

Foster made a routine save to deny Arshavin at his near-post and an acrobatic effort to keep out a searing drive from Tomas Rosicky as Arsenal threatened a third.

Nicklas Bendtner, who has been sidelined all season with a groin problem, was handed a late cameo appearance as a substitute for the home side.

The Dane’s absence has been felt, but so will that of the influential Wilshere, as he will now be banned for the next three matches after his over-the-top late lunge on Zigic.