The on-going crisis in refereeing was highlighted today with Martin Cryans, of the referee’s union, making an unconvincing appearance on BBC Sportsound this afternoon.
Steven Craven’s revelations in the Sunday Mail have caused uproar with the inner workings of the SFA brought to public attention.
Craven’s story paints a picture of widespread disillusionment amongst officials highlighted by the events at Tannadice a fortnight ago.
The actual penalty incident is becoming more and more of an irrelevance as details emerge of what went on in the referee’s room after the match and the subsequent comments of Hugh Dallas.
On Friday SFA Chief Executive Stewart Regan came as close as it’s possible to admitting that Dougie McDonald had lied immediately after the match to deflect attention away from himself.
Whether that information would have become public is very doubtful if Craven hadn’t resigned.
Today’s claim by Craven that Neil Lennon was lied to adds another dimension to the story with the former referee saying that Dallas was made aware of the true sequence of events on the evening of the match.
Despite knowing that the decision to over-rule the penalty had been instigated by Dougie McDonald Dallas went public to point the finger at Craven and compounded his mistakes by claiming that Neil Lennon left Tannadice in agreement with the u-turn.
Four days after the match Lennon told Channel 67: “I accepted the explanation, but still the decision rankles with me.
“I did the interview after the game and then I went to see the referee. I accepted his explanation of why he changed his mind, but I still don’t agree with it.”
The explanation that Lennon was given was that it was Craven’s intervention that over-ruled the penalty kick to Celtic.
Put on the spot by national radio today Cryans came over with all the confidence of a local government officer in charge of the paper-clips policy as he attempted to explain that all is well in Scottish refereeing.
Wearing his hat as chairman of the Scottish Senior Football Referees’ Association he totally ignored the issue of Lennon being lied to after the match.
Cryans said: “Dougie on leaving Tannadice immediately realised that that was not the way that he wanted it to be conducted (blaming Craven) and he informed Hugh Dallas of that fact.
“Hugh quite rightly was very upset at what he had heard and instructed and informed at that point that all of the match officials tell the truth and are truthful right the way down the line.
“Hugh’s comments in the aftermath conveyed that. Everything that he talked about in the overturning of the penalty decision, that Dougie had received information from Steven and that Dougie overturned the penalty.”
Cryans clearly doesn’t read the SFA’s own website.
On Friday after a meeting of the Referee Committee a statement on the SFA website read: “As is appropriate in these circumstances, Dougie, unprompted, decided to approach the assistant referee, Steven Craven, who had assumed the required position for the taking of the penalty.”
So Dougie didn’t receive information from Steven as Cryans claimed, Dougie went to Steven unprompted.
To compound the issue Dallas, who was fully aware of the true story about what went on, decided to go on a charm offensive by appearing on Radio Clyde and the bbc website to explain what had gone on.
During his BBC interview Dallas claimed: “Neil Lennon took the time to go to the referee’s dressing-room about 40 minutes after the match was concluded.
“They had a discussion and Neil accepted that the decision was correct. It was just unusual. I think Neil was extremely frustrated that he did not have the opportunity to get an explanation at that time, which is not possible.
“He received a full explanation, which he found acceptable after the match.”
Lennon wasn’t told the true story- he was lied to- and didn’t accept the decision as Dallas claimed.
Football fans are kept in the dark about decisions from officials, manager’s have a right to an explanation over incidents that they feel need clarified.
Despite clear evidence that he was lied to, and the claim that he left the referee’s room in agreement with the decision it is unknown whether anyone at the SFA has apologised to the Celtic manager.
Some prompt leadership is required immediately from the SFA, the game can’t afford to wait until next month’s meeting of the Referee Committee.
An announcement tomorrow morning from Regan at Hampden might go some way towards salvaging the integrity of the Scottish game.
Steven Craven- We Lied to Lenny
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I doubt very much that anyone in Scotland has any faith in Hugh Dallas.
He never was the model of honesty was he? Dallas was a cheat as a ref and was handed far too much power in his new post.
Cryans needs to be careful not to dig this hole even deeper than it is. Clearly he sees his little group of power hungry cheats, which he now seems to be part of, in grave danger of exposure and shame.
Craven has done Scotland proud and deserves to be applauded for this. We actually have a chance to rid Scotland of the age old corruption in the game.
We have dropped so far off the radar in world soccer and have a chance to gain some credence. Do the right thing. Expose and fire the cheats!
Or are there too many which would leave our game with fewer refs than we need to play? One thing is for certain. Dallas and now it appears Cryans should not be allowed the credible route out. They deserve to be fired so the public learn what was going on.