Jose Mourinho dismissed Arsenal's claims that John Obi Mikel should have been sent off as mere 'traditional bleating' and was equally contemptuous of home fans' chants about his side being boring.

The Chelsea manager set his team up to contain rather than attack, deploying three holding midfielders at the outset, and was rewarded with a 0-0 draw.

The frustrated Gunners claimed Mikel should have received a red card for a robust first half challenge on Mikel Arteta and that Theo Walcott should have had a penalty.

But Mourinho was not fazed.

“They like to cry, that's tradition,” he said. “I prefer to say that English people – Frank Lampard for example – would never provoke a situation like that. Some countries have that in their blood.

“Even if you are hurt, even if the opponent was aggressive, it should be OK, let's go. Keep going. That's English football Foreign players are bringing lots of good things, but I prefer English blood “It was a hard tackle, an aggressive one, but football is for men – or women with fantastic attitude.

“Football is a game of contact where sliding tackles come at a fantastic speed, so be proud and play with pride. I think the ref [Mike Dean] had a very good game.”

Referring to the home fans' accusations that Chelsea had been boring because of their emphasis on defence, Mourinho said: “I agree. I played against them 10 times and I never lost. What would you call it? I think they are doing very well. They should be happy. I think it was just part of the game.”

Reflecting on the draw, the Chelsea boss said: “I'm not unhappy with the result. We came to win, we wanted to win, we didn't want to lose.

“It was very important not to lose because if we lose we are five points behind the leader – now we are two points behind the leader and that's a different picture completely.”