Mikel Arteta left fuming with referee calls that cost Arsenal - 'He punched him in the head'

Mikel Arteta was left fuming that both penalty decisions went against his side and .

It was a tale of two spot kicks - one that was given and one that wasn't. Inter were awarded a penalty moments before half-time after Mikel Merino was deemed to have handled the ball with his arm away from his body. Mehdi Taremi flicked the ball on and, despite being close to the ball, the Arsenal man was penalised.

Hakan Calhanoglu converted for the hosts and that proved to be the winner at the San Siro - dealing Arsenal their first defeat of the season.

Before that though, Merino went up for a header in the Inter box with goalkeeper Yann Sommer bearing down on him. The Spaniard got to the ball first with the Swiss shot stopper instead making contact with the Arsenal player's head - not the ball - but escaped any punishment.

READ MORE:

READ MORE:

Arteta told : "I'm proud of my players, the level of domination we had, I feel we were harshly done tonight." He was asked to elaborate and said: "In the sense it was obvious."

He went on to say: "If you're going to give a penalty in the other box you have to give this one as he punched him in the head."

Addressing the decision that went against Merino he said: "There is no deflection, there is no danger in the box, there's nothing you can do as the ball is very close to your body. I don't know how you can get away from it. Especially if you're going to give that one, then the other one (for Arsenal) has to be 100 percent a penalty."

Arsenal's poor run of form continued after they were also beaten at at the weekend, but Arteta piled the pressure on the officials and underlined how vital their decisions are. "In the boxes, it is decided in the boxes. Every decision in the box makes a difference, this is clear," he said.

Martin Keown, the ex-Arsenal defender, too was left fuming by the decision and bemoaned the different interpretations that exist in the and the Champions League.

He said: "Is the arm in an unnatural position? and it isn't. I mean I don't know who determines that, VAR is never going to intervene, and then we have this debate again. I think it is ruining our game - it certainly ruined Arsenal's half-time team talk. I think they're hard done by there."

and receive your daily dose of Mirror Football content. We also treat our community members to special offers, promotions, and adverts from us and our partners. If you don't like our community, you can check out any time you like. If you're curious, you can read our