HAVE the Scottish football rulers already indicated Brendan Rodgers is wasting his time bothering to climb the stairs to the sixth floor of their Hampden lair tomorrow?
I pose the question following the SFA’s fairly bizarre decision to present the silver whistle to Don Robertson for Celtic’s Premiership visit to Livingston on Sunday.
Unless you have been living on the moon for the past 24 days, it cannot have escaped your notice that this is the same Don Robertson who was the referee involved in a bit of a kerfuffle in the capital when the champions lost 2-0 to Hearts on March 3 and, at the same time, were denied the opportunity of returning to the Premiership pinnacle.
SEEING RED…Don Robertson banishes bewildered Yang Hyun-jun much to the joy of Hearts defender Kye Rowles and the home supporters.
With John Beaton, his eagle-eyed VAR assistant, gibbering in his lughole, the whistler overturned an original yellow card in favour of red for the befuddled Yang Hyun-jun and, nearing the interval with the scoreline still blank, trotted dutifully over to his touchline monitor on the instructions of the master of the multi screens to review another innoucous incident.
Lo and behold and shivver me timbers, Robertson, after an unobstructed view of the moment the ball brushed the sleeve of Tomoki Iwata and had deemed no action was required, pranced back onto the field of play to point dramatically to the penalty spot.
Amid much hilarity and celebrating from the home support – and, presumably, more than a few interested parties glued to their TV sets throughout the land – the hosts accepted the gift and took the lead. The rest is history.
Rodgers commented on the “incompetence” of the decision-makers and his remarks, perfectly understandable to all who possess even a scintilla of knowledge of the beautiful game, irked the Scottish soccer svengalis who fired off a Notice of Complaint to summon the Celtic manager to their south side eyrie to explain his observations.
WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT, DON? Callum McGregor missed the capital capers, but the Celtic captain is clearly mystified by Don Robertson’s decision-making in a previous encounter.
The Irishman, with the backing of his board, will make his pitch tomorrow. However, would the gaffer be better off utilising his time to make sure he has reserved a good seat in the stand at the Tony Macaroni Arena on Sunday and Ibrox a week later?
If I am reading the situation correctly, it looks as though Rodgers is on an unavoidable collision course with a two-game suspension.
Would the SFA, with their limitless pool of common sense and superabundance of sound judgement, allow one of their match officials to take charge of a game which involved a manager who, a mere three days earlier, had just been proved absolutely correct in his dismissive judgement of his refereeing acumen?
Or is it more likely the Mount Florida gurus already have a fair idea of the outcome of tomorrow’s kangaroo court?
Dastardly deeds on the sixth floor of the national stadium? Surely not, dear reader.
However, there is a morsel of consolation for Celtic and their supporters.
On this occasion, beady-eyed Beaton will not be footering with the control stick in Clydesdale House. That honour has been bestowed upon Alan Muir.
ALEX GORDON
