You are in Scotland, wise up

Glasgow and Edinburgh have four stadiums with a capacity of 50,000 people or more: Murrayfield, Hampden, Celtic Park and Ibrox.  Hampden will be under lease to Uefa at the time of the Scottish Cup Final on 22 May.  This arrangement permits games to take place but prohibits fans from attending.

The Scottish Government (I’m not a fan, but to their credit), would almost certainly permit fans to attend, as their example-setters in London have already indicated they would do the same before that date.  Given this opportunity to have thousands of fans at a showpiece game, if you were in charge of the SFA you would move it from Hampden to Celtic Park, Ibrox, Murrayfield (my preference).  If necessary, you would move it to Cliftonhill to permit “the lifeblood of the game” to be in attendance.

However, you are not in charge of the SFA.  Given a choice between holding the Cup Final with fans at another venue, or holding it at an empty Hampden, the Association decided on the latter option.  These people!

Five Newco players were caught, red handed, breaking restrictions on Valentine’s Day.  They are free to face Celtic on Scottish Cup duty next weekend, nine weeks later.  Thanks to the SFA, suspensions will kick in days later.  Celtic broke zero restrictions in January, but rules were changed on-the-fly by the aforementioned Scottish Government, forcing Celtic to play two games at a critical time of the season without 16 players.

Don’t try to wreck your brain looking for fairness or consistency here, you’re in Scotland, wise up.