Sunderland 0-0 Arsenal

Gutless. Pathetic. The end of an era. Those were just some of the comments from Arsenal fans following yesterday’s 0-0 draw to Sunderland.

It wasn’t so much that Arsene Wenger and his side failed to beat a side facing relegation, it was more that the character and lack of effort from those on the pitch once again summed up all that is wrong with the club at the moment.

Aaron Ramsey failed to win a tackle the entire match which is criminal for a centre midfielder.

Any hopes of lifting the Premier League trophy realistically evaporated weeks ago but, while there was still a mathematical chance, fans expected and demanded more.

Instead, they witnessed a side that are ready for the season to finish and were thankful that Petr Cech was ready to produce a double save from Jermain Defoe and Yann M’Vila.

Victory would have sent the Gunners back above Man City into third. Instead they are looking over their shoulders at Manchester United for that final Champions League spot.

“It’s not the result we want,” said Wenger after. “We wanted to win the game and now we have focus on the next one.

“We created a few chances and couldn’t take them. They defended well in fairness. We had enough chances to win the game but not enough to score today.”

However, it is nothing that Arsenal fans haven’t heard before and some would rather their team lose as it would give more ammunition to the Wenger Out campaign that is constantly gaining momentum.

The goal-less draw lifts Sunderland out of the relegation zone on goal difference and manager Sam Allardyce was pleased with the performances from his Black Cats.

“I thought [in the] second half we did maybe enough to pinch the game 1-0. We had chances to maybe score and [I’m] not saying Arsenal didn’t have chances, because they did, but with the amount of possession they had we did well to limit them to shots outside the box."