Rio Ferdinand has hit out at Gary Neville after his former Manchester United team-mate accused Arsenal players of being “disrespectful” against Manchester City.

Mikel Arteta’s side were visibly amped up for Sunday’s Premier League clash with City, which saw the Gunners humiliate their rivals 5-1. Tensions between the two sides, which have been bubbling for several seasons, were immediately visible as Arsenal defender Gabriel Magalhaes celebrated in Erling Haaland’s face after Martin Odegaard gave the hosts the lead two minutes in.

There were various other back-and-forths between the pair, while 18-year-old Gunners left-back Myles Lewis-Skelly also appeared to mock Haaland by imitating his celebration after netting their third goal, having been goaded by the Norwegian during their last encounter earlier this season.

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But despite the fiery nature of the clash making for a throwback spectacle, United legend Neville took issue with some of the Arsenal players’ behaviour on the pitch. The Sky Sports commentator, who was involved in many a heated fixture with Arsenal in his own playing days, labelled Gabriel’s actions in particular “disrespectful”.

Yet his former Red Devils team-mate Ferdinand believes such actions are all part of what makes the Premier League so exciting. He pointed at Neville’s own actions in the past while praising youngster Lewis-Skelly for showing the confidence to take a dig at City’s star player.

He said on Rio Ferdinand presents: “One of the best things to come out of the game was Myles Lewis-Skelly. It was just nice to see a bit of needle in the game. I saw Gary Neville saying it’s disrespectful, what he did with his celebration or Gabriel did in front of Haaland’s face and stuff like that.

“Some of the biggest and most iconic moments in Premier League history aren’t about football. Roy Keane in the tunnel with Patrick Vieira, Martin Keown with Ruud van Nistelrooy, Emmanuel Adebayor running the length of the pitch at City to celebrate in front of the Arsenal fans.

“These things are nothing to do with kicking a football but they’re part of [the spectacle]. And you hear people say ‘you shouldn’t do that’. Come on man. Gary Neville - one of his biggest moments was grabbing his badge in front of Liverpool fans after my goal. One of the visually iconic moments in his career.

“This is part of the emotion of football and why you tune in. The soap opera vibes. For an 18-year-old to do that celebration after Haaland said ‘who the f*** are you?’ a few months ago, that was sick for me. Iconic.”

The rivalry between City and Arsenal stems from the Gunners plucking manager Arteta from Pep Guardiola’s backroom staff in late 2019. It reached another level when Arteta went on to poach Gabriel Jesus and Oleksandr Zinchenko from City’s ranks, resulting in Arsenal challenging the Etihad side for the title in the previous two seasons.

City have come out on top on both occasions but there is no doubting the respect they now show the Gunners, even if that isn’t always clear on the pitch. Haaland, following City’s 2-2 draw with a ten-man Arsenal at the Etihad in September, threw a ball at Gabriel’s head and infamously told Arteta to ‘stay humble’.

It was clear that Gabriel had not forgiven nor forgotten those antics, having asked the Norwegian to retrieve his loose boot for him on Sunday, while City’s sole goal-scorer Haaland later hit back by pointing at the Premier League winners’ crest on his arm. Opinions on social media have been split between fans who enjoyed the rivalry on show and those who felt it went too far.

Neville was part of the latter, telling Sky Sports after the match: "I want to mention Gabriel and what he did to Haaland. It happened to me here, actually. Not here, it was at Highbury many, many years ago. Where a player came up and screamed in my face. We actually won the game 4-2 that day. I actually don't like it. I think it's a bit disrespectful.

"I get the fact that Haaland's sort of pantomime villain here today, but there's something about it that I didn't like about it. I was many things but I never did that. I never went and screamed in a player's face. I don't know, I just felt there's something about that I thought made me feel a little bit uneasy, a little bit disrespectful."