Arsenal at war as Adebayor clash bloodies Bendtner nose

Arsenal departed the Carling Cup with a snarl last night as Emmanuel Adebayor and Nicklas Bendtner were involved in an ugly spat in the home side's penalty area which left the Denmark international with a cut on the bridge of his nose and blood staining his shirt.

Frustration boiled over late on when, with the visitors trailing 4-1 and preparing to take a corner, Bendtner, who had already put through his own net, and the substitute Adebayor started pushing and shoving each other at the far post. Tempers were frayed further once the Dane had been cut - there were suggestions that he had been head-butted by his team-mate - with the pair eventually separated by their captain, William Gallas. He also remonstrated angrily with Bendtner, while Eduardo da Silva and Bacary Sagna dragged Adebayor from the scene.

That prompted the referee Howard Webb to approach both strikers, with Bendtner's nose already swelling up, and admonish them for their actions before Cesc Fábregas's corner was taken. The rest of the game was played out to an uneasy truce, the unused substitute Mathieu Flamini bellowing from the dug-out at Adebayor to "calm down". Arsène Wenger insisted he had been unaware of the incident. Regardless, a member of Arsenal's medical staff appeared to hold Adebayor back at the mouth of the tunnel while the rest of the visiting players trudged back to the dressing room.

"I think everyone was disappointed about the score," Gallas said of the clash. "It was difficult to accept but we were very nervous and we lost our calm. They know they made a mistake and maybe they'll have to speak to the boss now and explain what they did. They are both young but they have to understand."

The incident was a bitter way for Arsenal to exit the competition, with Wenger admitting the 5-1 thrashing was a "brutal" result and suggesting that his younger players may not have been ready for the contest. "We were not mature enough to stop their counter-attacking," admitted Wenger. "My players have potential, but you could see that some players were not completely ready for that. We were always running after the score, taking risks and being at risk at to the counter-attack. But it's part of a learning process. When you're a football player you have to deal with disappointments."