Gerrard and Lampard slam Mendy over ‘cheap shot’ tweet

LONDON: Manchester City defender Benjamin Mendy was criticised on Saturday following comments he made on social media about Brighton defender Lewis Dunk’s own goal.

Mendy, who missed City’s 2-0 away win over Brighton in the Premier League on Saturday, used Twitter to poke fun at Dunk whose header gave the visitors a two-goal advantage.

“Bullet header,” Mendy tweeted following his goal that was scored 15 minutes before time.

A clinical Sergio Aguero strike and Dunk’s own goal condemned Brighton to a losing return to the top flight at the Falmer Stadium.

City struggled to break a stubborn Brighton side down until Aguero fired home to open the scoring in the 70th minute.

Five minutes later, Dunk slammed a header into his own net as he tried to clear a cross under pressure from Jesus, with the home side lacking the firepower to mount a comeback in the closing stages.

Mendy later issued an explanation, suggesting it was nothing more than ‘banter’.

“Sorry to the few people who got offended... was just banter nothing personal. Enjoy your night everyone. #CmonCity,” he tweeted.

But that didn’t wash with BT Sport pundits Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard.

Lampard and Gerrard, who were analysing City’s performance at the time, said it was the wrong way to behave as a fellow professional.

Gerrard said: “To be honest I don’t like to see that, there’s no need for it. There will be a time this season when Mendy makes a mistake and he’s going to be wide open to criticism.”

Lampard added: “I agree with Stevie there. Why don’t you just have a few seconds to double check that that’s the right thing to send?

“Steve is exactly right. He’s got to play this season and he might get done at some stage, someone else might want to tweet about him.”

The former Liverpool captain Gerrard said Vincent Kompany, the City skipper, should have a quiet word with Mendy.

“I would,” he said when asked whether he would have said something had the incident happened at Liverpool. “I think it’s disrespectful to a fellow professional and I think there’s totally no need for it at all.” Agencies