No wonder Arsene Wenger is growing angry... Granit Xhaka was Arsenal's big midfield summer signing but he is becoming an expensive liability

XHAKA

October: 'It is one red card. It is what it is and he has to learn from it.'

November: 'He has to work and keep control of his reactions in the game.'

This weekend: 'He has to control his game and not punish the team.'

You can almost sense Arsene Wenger's growing anger with the man who is quickly turning into a £35million liability.

Several times this season Arsenal's manager has had to answer questions about Granit Xhaka and his disciplinary record. Nine sending offs since 2014 will do that.

At this week's press conference, Wenger will be asked about the talented 24-year-old's temperament again.

Xhaka almost cost his club three points in the title race on Sunday by being sent off against Burnley for a two-footed foul on Steven Defour.

There's no doubting he is gifted. His showings for Switzerland at the summer's European Championship in France had Arsenal fans anticipating his arrival, with a relentless work rate and tidy distribution.

His ratings, via Sportsmail's match reports from France, were consistent. He got 8 out of 10 vs Albania, 7 vs Romania, 7 vs France and 7 vs Poland. There was a penalty sent wide in Saint-Etienne but that can happen to anyone in football.

XHAKA'S RED MIST

Gladbach (2012-16): 108 games, 236 fouls, 29 yellows, 5 reds

Arsenal (2016 - present): 19 games, 24 fouls, 2 yellows, 2 reds

Switzerland:  48 caps, 1 red card

Xhaka's ability to stay cool, however, is another story.

After he signed for Arsenal from Borussia Monchengladbach and had trained with his team-mates at London Colney, Xhaka was asked in an interview with Swiss newspaper Apenzeller Zeitung about Wenger.

'He's told me he's very impressed by how I train and how I'm a disciplined character,' Xhaka said.

Apples and oranges. It's no good keeping cool in training, only to then lose it in a game, as he did against Swansea and Burnley.

It is not only dismissals, either. Giving away an unnecessary penalty at Bournemouth gave Arsenal a mountain to climb and turned into another case of two points dropped.

PLAYERS WITH MOST RED CARDS IN EUROPE'S BIG LEAGUES 

 Past two seasons:

5- Granit Xhaka

4 - Gabriel Paletta

4 - Kelvin Malcuit

4- Yannick Cahuzac

3 - Younousse Sankhare

3 - Felipe Melo

3 - Aythami Artiles

3 - Victor Wanyama

 This season:

 3 - Granit Xhaka

2 - Kelvin Malcuit

2 - Sergi Gomez

2 - Fernandinho

2 - Gabriel Paletta

2 - Cedric Varrault

2 - Chieck Doukoure

2 - Yannick Cahuzac

Xhaka didn't arrive squeaky clean, though. He came with a ready-made reputation from Germany.

When Wenger vetted him – to see if he would meet his Arsenal model – he will have known that he was needlessly sent off several times for Monchengladbach.

There was the one against Freiburg in April 2014, when the score was 1-1 but Xhaka's sending off saw his side suffer a 4-2 loss.

There was another against Sevilla in the Europa League in February 2015, a tie which saw Monchengladbach dumped out of the tournament after a 3-2 defeat.

Xhaka's opinion of the Premier League in the summer, then, is starting to seem misguided.

'In Germany you can play aggressively but the referee will always blow his whistle,' he said in May. 'In England that's not the case.'

He says he cannot play well if he does not do so aggressively. Is it a risk worth taking? Was it a risk worth spending such a chunk of change on?

Wenger thought so because he knows what Xhaka can bring to this team.

Before kick-off against Burnley, Xhaka was the Arsenal player with the most Premier League passes this season on 1,175. That was despite him having only started 14 of their 21 games.

He was likened to Emmanuel Petit in pre-season, too. Trouble is, they need him on the pitch, not off it.

Arsenal didn't appeal his red card against Swansea in October, showing they knew it was worthy of a three-game suspension.

And they will not appeal this one against Burnley, because they know it was worthy of a sending off as well as Jon Moss did. This time it's four games.

Wenger was the so-called soft touch who had no midfield warriors. With Xhaka, that's no longer the case.

Arsenal's manager has spoken to his summer signing several times this season, though his words appear to have went in one ear then out the other.

'Intelligence means you don't make the same mistake twice,' Wenger said three months ago. 'I hope he learns from that.'

Lightning has struck twice for Arsenal this season but, worryingly, also nine times in the last three years.