Wolves star aims a sly dig at Arsenal

Despite going a man down in the second half, Arsenal claimed a 1-0 win over Wolverhampton Wanderers on Thursday night.

Arsenal celebrated their 1-0 win over Wolves like they had ‘won the league’, according to midfielder Ruben Neves.

The Gunners claimed a first win in 2022 at Molineux to move up to fifth in the Premier League table, one point outside the top-four and with two games in hand over fourth-placed West Ham.

Not even Gabriel Martinelli’s dismissal in the 69th-minute could spoil the evening – much to Neves’ bemusement.

“We saw the way they celebrated the win, and that shows the level we are,” said the Wolves star on the club’s website at the final whistle.

“I didn’t see Arsenal celebrating like this in the past 10 years – it was like they won the league.”

Gabriel scored the all-important winning goal in the 25th-minute by bundling home Alexandre Lacazette’s flick-on.

There was a slight delay for confirmation of the goal, as a VAR review was held to investigate whether Lacazette fouled Wolves keeper Jose Sa in the buildup to Gabriel’s winner.

“We did well but we are struggling to score goals and conceding a lot on set-pieces,” continued Neves.

“With their goal, there is some doubt about whether it was a foul or not but that’s football. We are used to these decisions.

“We need to improve a lot on scoring goals because we are creating chances but we’re not good enough in that part of the game.

“I can accept the decision about their goal, but in some games they give it and in some games they don’t. They need to do the same decisions in every game because it’s frustrating for us.”

Wolves will face another north London outfit on Sunday in Tottenham, while Arsenal will next take on Brentford at home on February 19.