West Ham forward Marko Arnautovic publicly apologised to the club’s fans following his first-half dismissal in Saturday’s 3-2 defeat away to Southampton.
Referee Lee Mason showed the enigmatic attacker a straight red card in the 33rd minute for using his arm to make contact with the face of Saints defender Jack Stephens.
The visitors were left with 10 men for over an hour, but sensationally recovered from two goals down to eventually pull level through Javier Hernandez, only for Charlie Austin’s 93rd-minute penalty to deny them a share of the points.
Arnautovic took to social media after the match to say sorry to his team-mates and the club’s supporters.
A message from Marko: pic.twitter.com/kEcHUO7zBx
— West Ham United (@WestHamUtd) August 19, 2017
Hammers boss Slaven Bilic said he had spoken with Arnautovic after the match, but declined to comment on the incident.
“I’m the manager, I want to talk about the game. Those decisions I’m going to leave to someone else to talk about,” Bilic told Sky Sports.
Arnautovic’s red card is his second in as many seasons against Southampton, having been dismissed while playing for Stoke City last term.
Former Arsenal and England defender Sol Campbell is the only other player to have been sent off twice against the Saints in the Premier League.
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