Xhaka brutally slammed by Gary Neville as Arsenal star gives away awful penalty against Tottenham
ARSENAL were plunged into derby day gloom when Granit Xhaka handed Tottenham a stonewall penalty - much to Gary Neville's disgust.
The North London clash was already going Spurs' way when the Swiss midfielder clumsily dived in on Son Heung-min.
Ref Martin Atkinson took very little time to point to the spot after the hack, which came with the ball well gone.
Commentating on the game for Sky, former Manchester United star Neville lamented the incident.
He felt it summed up how Xhaka has failed to learn from his mistakes despite being one of the more senior members of the Arsenal squad.
Neville described the midfielder as: "Absolute madness from Xhaka from an experienced player who never becomes experienced.
"He does it week in week out and never learns."
In the studio at half-time, Graeme Souness gave a similar opinion, chiding: “That’s something you learn in your first week as a professional.”
Xhaka has 76 caps for Switzerland and almost 150 games for the Gunners under his belt.
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Such is his value to Unai Emery's side, he was made the leader of a captain's group that the coach had earmarked to lead the team into the new season.
However it was a case of individual errors costing them early on versus Spurs, Harry Kane tucking away the penalty after Christian Eriksen tapped home the opener following a Bernd Leno error.
The German keeper made a hash of a tame shot by Erik Lamela in the tenth minute.