Nottingham Forest defender Ola Aina has trolled Arsenal fans following his controversial handball incident in the draw with the Gunners over the weekend.
Arsenal drew 0-0 away to Nottingham Forest on Saturday, but the Gunners could have snuck a win in the latter stages of the match if a penalty had been awarded for a handball by Ola Aina.
In trying to prevent a corner, Aina clearly dragged the ball back into play via a glancing contact with his arm. Yet despite a VAR review, a spot-kick wasn’t awarded, with the Premier League claiming “the ball was played off Aina’s shoulder first, while his arm was also in a natural position”.
Aina himself had quite a different view on the incident, and he took to social media after the game to joke about getting away with one.
In a post on Instagram, Aina shared a few photos of himself during the match, including one of the handball. But he also included a picture of WWE wrestler Eddie Guerrero, whose catchphrase was “I lie! I cheat! I steal!”
In case anyone missed the reference, Aina shared the post on his Instagram story and he included the audio clip of Guerrero’s walkout song saying those same words: “I lie! I cheat! I steal!”
Aina did also clarify on his story that the post was “just a bit of banter”, but it makes it pretty clear he knows it could easily have been given as a penalty.
Despite the obvious disappointment for Arsenal fans of not having been awarded the spot-kick, it’s refreshing to see a player effectively admitting they benefitted from a bad call.
It’s definitely the expectation in modern football that you’ll just come out and blindly defend any decision your team get after the final whistle.
But the game is done, nothing can change the result. There’s no real reason not to admit what everyone can already see with their eyes and have a bit of a joke about it.