Arsenal 2 - 1 Newcastle ; Winning ugly
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Winning ugly: Emirates brawl as Vermaelen hands Arsenal late victory
Head to head: Time Krull and Robin van Persie square up to each other during the game
Rivals: Van Persie grins at Krul after taunting the goalkeeper about Arsenal's late winning goal
Thomas Vermaelen scored a dramatic, last-gasp winner against Newcastle to take Arsenal to within a point of third-placed Tottenham, but the victory was marred by ugly clashes late on.
A verbal spat between Arsenal’s Robin van Persie — who earlier cancelled out Hatem Ben Arfa’s opening goal — and Newcastle goalkeeper Tim Krul triggered the scenes after the Belgium defender’s 95th-minute winner.
It is understood the arguments spilled into the Emirates Stadium tunnel at full time.
It is claimed Van Persie was furious with Krul for what he viewed as constant time wasting by his fellow Dutchman.
Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger said: ‘I don’t know what happened between Krul and Van Persie — I don’t know if they have history from Holland. I will speak to Robin to find out. But it shows just how committed Robin is to the cause.
‘We are refusing to lose at the moment. We are one point from Spurs but we only want to focus on ourselves. We have confidence and belief.’
Getting physical: Van Persie is booked by referee Howard Webb
Newcastle boss Alan Pardew added: ‘I don’t really know what was going on at the end. When there’s a last-minute goal things tend to spill over.
‘There were verbals between Van Persie and our goalkeeper. Maybe our keeper took a bit too long for one or two of the kicks.
‘Obviously we are disappointed, even more so because we had the ball in their corner in the 94th minute. We were running out of steam and I can’t fault my players for their commitment and effort. We have to make sure this doesn’t put us on a downer between now and the end of the season.’
Man of the match Theo Walcott said: ‘Tottenham have got to be watching over their shoulders. We’ve got the players here and believe we can go further. We’ve got great attacking players but are getting it right defensively.’
Vermaelen added: ‘I think we can overtake Tottenham. We are on a good run and we are close to Tottenham now.
Playing till the death: Thomas Vermaelen scores the winner in injury time
Flat out: Arsenal got their reward deep into stoppage time
'We showed the mentality of fighters. It's the fourth time we've come back from 1-0 down.
'In the second half we were pushing and pushing. We knew we had to be patient and in the end we will score a goal, and that's what happened.'
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They will still clash in Euro 2012
same country