William Gallas: Chelsea Are Liars

Arsenal will be hoping to put a week-and-a-bit of turmoil and controversy behind them when they skip across London to face Chelsea on Sunday.

At the centre of it all is William Gallas, who was removed from the club captaincy and temporarily banished from the first team after publicly criticising his team-mates.

However, the French defender's autobiography has done nothing to shift the focus. In a passage reprinted in The Sun, he blasted his former bosses at the Blues for falsifying the nature of his departure in 2006.

Chelsea infamously claimed that Gallas threatened to score for the opposition if he wasn't allowed to make the switch to Ashburton Grove.

But the 31-year-old said: “They ignored the truth. For them, I was a player who would score an own-goal.

“Who cared if I’d given them five years of my life, my passion, a Premier League title to share.

“They remembered only the mega-false version of their club. I was gutted.”

Cecil Braun