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Arsene Wenger bitterly accused Blackburn of displaying a 'desire of violence' after seeing Jens Lehmann's second-half blunder cost Arsenal victory in a 1-1 draw at Ewood Park on Sunday.

A game which saw referee Alan Wiley brandish nine yellow cards - two of them to Blackburn captain Ryan Nelsen - ended all square with David Dunn's long-range effort cancelling out Robin van Persie's first-half opener for Arsenal.

But although both teams appeared to play in the same committed manner, Arsenal manager Wenger angrily hit out at the home side at the end of the game.

"I am pleased with the attitude of my players and the resilience that they showed," said Wenger.

"They battled very hard and they are obviously frustrated because we should have come away with the three points.

"But we were very resilient against a team that were over-physical. I felt sometimes that there was a desire of violence rather than commitment in some of the challenges.

"We did well, though, and we wanted to play. We had to cope with a lot of long balls and set-pieces from Blackburn. This is a difficult place to come to and you can be happy if you come here and get a point."

Having fought to rid his team of their 'bully-boy' tag, Blackburn manager Hughes hit back at Wenger's comments by suggesting that Arsenal's players were just as culpable.

"That actually surprises me because I felt that the worst challenge of the game was van Persie's on Ryan Nelsen," said Hughes.

"I saw Reading's Dave Kitson sent off for the same challenge against Manchester United last week. But there are two teams involved and I'm sure there are two views of the game.

"I felt that Arsenal competed well. The only issue for me was the amount of time the referee gave for stoppages following injuries."

Lehmann's error came just a week after a similar gaffe allowed Fulham's David Healy to score against Arsenal at the Emirates, but Wenger insisted that the German will not be held to account for the mistake.

"Of course, Jens is really unhappy with it and he is really down in the dressing room," said Wenger.

"I don't need to tell him because he is an intelligent boy, but we don't want to blame him. I would rather keep the positives from our performance."

Arsenal, who lost defender William Gallas to a groin strain that will sideline him for two weeks, were fortunate to avoid a defeat and Blackburn boss Hughes admitted that he was delighted with the performance of his team.

He said: "I thought it was an excellent performance by my players from start to finish. We were very much on the front foot and we really pressured Arsenal from start to finish.

"I felt we could go on to win the game because we were in the ascendancy to such an extent, but they had to make a change in order to curb our possession."