Partick Thistle or St Mirren?
Referees believe that John Reid’s suggestion that they declare their ‘sporting allegiance’ is unworkable.
The Celtic chairman’s response to a question at the club’s AGM backing MP Peter Wishart’s suggestion seems to have caused a lot of fear within the refereeing community.
Referees are banned from speaking out about decisions but one top ref has given The Sun his reaction to Reid’s proposal.
Speaking anonymously he said: “”It is just unworkable. There are only about 15 refs in the country who take SPL games.
“If they started being ruled out because of who they support we could struggle to get enough to take charge of all the games.
“We have a meeting of all Grade One referees on Sunday and I’m sure it will be top of the list.”
Former referee Kenny Clark went much further with his criticism of Reid.
The Paisley based ref made a string of high profile mistakes throughout his career and even owned up to an honest mistake when he ignored Steven Smith’s brutal challenge on Neil Lennon in front of the Copland Road stand that should have given Celtic a penalty.
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The thought that taking referees away from matches involving the club that they support- as happens in England- has clearly upset Clark who has almost become a stand-in for Hugh Dallas who seems to have gone to ground since Steven Craven exposed the cover-up after the Dundee United-Celtic match last month.
Clark squealed: “There has been some amount of nonsense talked in the past few weeks, but this latest claptrap really does win first prize.
“As suggestions go, I can’t think of anything more ludicrous. The implication is that refs cannot be trusted and if that’s where we’re at then we might as well blow the whistle two or three times and pick up the ball. It’s game over.
“Let’s be honest, every referee out there supported one club or another.”
Rather than deal with the issue Clark’s response is to pick the ball up and walk away.
With a number of referees earning a living on the after-dinner circuit recalling with a laugh how they refereed matches involving their favourite club officials are always open to suspicion.
The declaration of sporting allegiance doesn’t have to happen overnight, new referees could simply be put in charge of matches that don’t involve their team.
Clark’s lack of maturity on the issue really comes to the fore when he criticises Reid’s performance at the Celtic AGM.
As one long departed radio pundit once said: ‘Were you at the game (AGM) caller?
Clark slammed Reid for pandering to the audience at the Celtic AGM- something that every club chairman does but not many clubs open the door to the media at their AGM.
“It just seems to me that the meeting was a blatant exercise in pandering to the shareholders and Celtic support at large by telling them what they want to hear,” Clark added.
“I expected better of Reid. I would have expected him to rise about this kind of nonsense. Unfortunately he hasn’t been able to do that.”
Once officials are taken out of matches involving the club that they have a sporting allegiance to there will be less for Kenny Clark and referees to get upset over.
If it’s good enough for England, Uefa and Fifa surely it’s the way forward in Scotland as well?
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Hasn’t Clark just exposed his allegiance with this outburst?
He was always one of the worst and most blatant and is now reacting because he thinks he will be forced to come clean!
This said, I just want the board and Lennon to focus on winning games. These people who caused all the corruption in our game are getting exactly what they were after.
Lennon has taken his eye off the ball!