SFA SHOULD HAVE BEEN TOUGHER OVER CELTIC WEB RANT AT REF - Leggat

[ian1964 10,409]

THE problem the Scottish Football Association is having with referees at the moment can be traced back a mere nine months to their feeble reaction to an incredible claim on the official Celtic website.

 

You may recall that less than two hours after Rangers had won the Old Firm game at Ibrox in February, in a match which saw the Parkhead captain Scott Brown sent off, the official Celtic website made an astonishing attack on the referee.

 

It claimed no fair minded person could agree the sending off of Brown was the correct decision.

 

The clear implication was the referee was not a fair minded person. The further implication being that he was biased.

 

Yet, when the matter was referred to the SFA's General Purposes Committee,it led to the SFA giving Celtic no more than a slap on the wrist, in the form of a censure.

 

It was hardly the sort of defence a referee deserved from the SFA, and perhaps there was resentment among officials at the lenient way Celtic were dealt with.

 

At the time I felt the SFA decision was tantamount to sparing the rod and spoiling the child. Or, to put it another way, giving an inch which would soon become a mile.

 

However, that was not the first time Celtic appeared to have been indulged by the SFA in recent years.

 

When Hugh Dallas was felled and bloodied by a missile, to the extent that his wound needed stitching, the men in charge of the SFA at the time felt the offence was serious enough to warrant a substantial fine.

 

However, by the time Fernando Ricksen was also battered by a missile and also needed a wound stitched, the SFA appeared to have lost its grip. A slap on the wrist was all that followed, despite the previous.

 

At the time surely stronger action was needed to lay down a marker. Perhaps an order to close the ground for a couple of matches - suspended for five years - was the way to head off any more trouble.

 

People who heaped ridicule on such a suggestion were noticeably quieter just two years later when the Rangers doctor became the latest victim of the missile throwers inside Parkhead.

 

Much of what has followed - and which has climaxed in the refereeing strike - has appeared to take root in a support which gives every sign of being out of control.

 

Two years ago on Remembrance weekend the Green Brigade staged a protest against Celtic wearing a Poppy on their strips. The protest was inside Parkhead in the exact same area of the same stand where the Bloodstained Poppy banner was raised this month.

 

Surely therefore, nobody inside Celtic should have been surprised the Green Brigade - a group many may believe the club has over-indulged - should have staged some sort of protest.

 

Last Saturday there was more bother in the same section of the stand, and Celtic chairman the Baron Reid of Cardowan, was the subject of more hate filled banners.

 

And that despite some harsh words spoken by the Baron Reid of Cardowan regarding the SFA at the Celtic AGM. It seems it is impossible for anyone inside Celtic to go far enough to satisfy the zealots and extremists who have attached themselves to the club.

 

Yet there are still some media outlets who would have people believe the strike action being taken by referees has been prompted by a number of actions by a number of clubs, their managers, players and supporters.

 

In fact, any of these run-of-the-mill confrontations which have taken place in recent weeks and months have been no more than we have witnessed over the years, and are what referees regard as usual.

 

What has been unusual has been the perception of a campaign to get rid of Hugh Dallas, undermine the SFA and create anarchy, which has many Celtic supporters whipping themselves into a lathered frenzy.

 

There was even a letter to UEFA from one Celtic supporter begging for intervention. A supplication which was quickly kicked into touch by that higher authority.

 

Does that make UEFA party to a great conspiracy?

 

Goodness knows what they think about what's going on in Scottish football. Maybe the Eurocrats are having a sly wee snigger behind their hands at the way Celtic supporters are ranting.

 

But surely there is somebody within UEFA who can see the danger, and who can have a quiet word with the Baron Reid of Cardowan and ask him to try and calm Celtic supporters before some extremist and zealot commits one of act of madness which even the recently supine Scottish Football Assocation cannot dismiss with a mere censure.

 

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