My centre-halves are 10 times better than Arsenal’s –Warnock
NEIL Warnock has declared his Cardiff City centre-backs are ‘10 times better’ than those of Arsenal.
The Bluebirds boss waded into the Gunners following their woeful performance against Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park, labelling their defensive efforts as “elementary”.
The Gunners were outclassed in every department by Sam Allardyce’s Eagles as the Palace fans were treated to a 3-0 victory over their opponents.
And the Bluebirds boss was adamant that he’d much rather have the likes of Bruno Manga, Sol Bamba and Sean Morrison at the centre of his defence, as opposed to the men Arsene Wenger has at his disposal.
German Shkodran Mustafi and Brazilian Gabriel played against Palace in the absence of Laurent Koscielny and couldn’t handle the threat of Christian Benteke and exBluebird Wilfried Zaha.
Speaking on TalkSport, Warnock said: “I wouldn’t swap their centrehalves for my centre halves, I think my centre halves are ten times better than what they’ve got.
“The biggest thing for me was one of the high balls that came in during the first half, and the centre half looked at Benteke three times during the ball coming down to see he was coming ... and he never went for it.”
Warnock joined the Bluebirds after a poor start to the season saw them fall into the relegation zone, with a goal difference of -11 after just 11 games.
Since his arrival, Cardiff have dramatically improved at the back. The Bluebirds have only lost two games by more than a one goal margin, both 3-1 defeats against Aston Villa and Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Warnock, a big fan of Wenger, was keen not to criticise the Frenchman. Instead, he challenged the role played by Arsenal’s assistant manager, Steve Bould.
“I must admit I was looking at Bould, you can’t just sit there and do nothing if you’re told to, you have to put your point of view over.
“What has got to me for a few weeks is the marking at corner kicks, which is just elementary really, so does he [Bould] have enough about him to do anything about it?
“I’ve got Kevin Blackwell and Ronnie Jepson besides me and they’d tell me straight up if they thought I’d got it wrong and then we’d go and work on it.
“You can’t nowadays play at that top level without knowing who is marking who and who the biggest threat is. There’s no defence for that sort of thing.”