The dust has settled on yet another derby match. Yet another match where Celtic players, management and fans have a grievance with the match officials.
I’ve got four grievances and listed them below
Yesterday, Cha Du-Ri was red carded for doing something that opposition players at Celtic Park are often allowed to do without even conceding a free kick. The argument in favour of Cha being given a red card is that he denied Lee Wallace a goal scoring opportunity. The rules of the game state that doing such a thing is a red card offence.
Let’s examine that. First up, Wallace has played, in professional football, 177 times and scored 3 goals so what made the referee think that he was going to score from outside the box at such an angle ?
Charlie Mulgrew was covering from the centre back position so could you argue that he was going to catch Wallace ? I’m not saying that he would have done and I’m not saying that he wouldn’t have either.
Yes Cha was caught out of position and not for the first time but regardless of that, he shouldn’t have been sent off.
With those two factors, how someone can tell me that Cha denied a clear goal scoring opportunity is beyond me. Keep in mind that the red card is issued for denying a clear goal scoring opportunity, not a ‘he might have scored opportunity’. In turn, this means that the ref has either made an ‘honest mistake’ or something else.
I would buy into the “honest mistake” excuse, however, I can’t. If they were honest mistakes, then why do we never benefit from several match changing decisions in the one match
The next one was Victor Wanyama, he has cleanly won the ball. Have you ever saw a football player being sent off for winning the ball ?
Yes, I accept that he went in with both feet but so did Lee McCulloch when he injured Birim Kayal. That’s a red card for the Celtic player and nothing for the Rangers player.
When Rangers played Arbroath in the cup, Carlos Bocanegra was booked for winning the ball with a two footed challenge. Is anyone willing to guess on who the referee was ?
I researched that while writing the piece and wasn’t surprised at all to discover that it was the same referee- Calum Murray. How can he only give a yellow card to a Rangers player but a red to a Celtic player for a similar incident?
The third big decision that I picked up on was one that Neil Lennon also mentioned in his post match comments. When Rangers scored their second goal it looked offside.
TV replays have proved that to be the case.
There was an assistant ref almost in line with it, so why didn’t he see it ? Was he incompetent too or was it something else?
Next point up for me was the fact that Steven Whittaker was allowed to, with both hands, bring one of our players down inside the penalty box. Can anyone say why that it wasn’t a penalty?
The referee or assistant should have been well positioned to see such a thing. If not, why not, these referees are reported to be on £850 per match so simply missing something or making honest mistakes isn’t good enough.
On the build up to the third Rangers goal, there was a foul in the middle of the pitch that wasn’t given to us. Adam Matthews had a player tackle him from behind to take the ball off him. With nine men on the pitch, you need fouls to be given when they are committed.
So, to summarise, my points are that we had two wrong or debatable red cards, an offside goal scored against us, a foul not given in the build up to a 3rd goal against us and a stone wall penalty denied.
I realise that this piece has been pretty negative and probably done in quite an angry tone but that’s because I am fed up with our club being on the receiving end up such decisions and feel it’s time for both the clubs and fans to stand up against it.
And the best thing is that my initial response to Rangers fans is to remind them that their club still doesn’t have two coins to rub together, they are still facing liquidation and still 18 points behind us the league
It must be said too that such a young football team showed remarkable discipline not to lose the plot with so much going against them. With so many opponents to play against, it’s remarkable that we finished the match with a one goal deficit. Well done to Neil Lennon and the bhoys and the fans who turned up.
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I would like to point out an incident you may have missed or maybe I am being to paranoid but the tackle on Whittaker may have been two footed but you have to watch Whittaker, both his feet leave the ground too but he went over the ball deliberately to hurt Victor and the footage of the game will show you that he got Victor studs first on the Shin.
Why wasn’t Whittaker sent of for a two footed tackle????????
Hail Hail
There was no way ref was going to give us anything yesterday but we are doing ourselves no good by blaming him for the result.
Ten green bottlers yesterday and bizarrw decisions re personnel and formation.
Ki shouldn’t be allowed to play competitive football, he can’t compete. Stopped running after Aluko left him but if he’d kept going he would’ve been able to intercept before ball got into box. He was same last week.
I asked about 40 mins in if Ledley was playing, think I saw him once after that.
Cha, happiest guy in the world but can’t defend and Mathhews stuck at left back.
Lennon misrepresenting the ‘security’ issue is beyond embarrassing and yesterday’s defeat against a team in their knees is shambolic.
If yesterday is if any benefit it should be to show us our limitations. Team excelled in turning round a massive deficit to win the league & fair play.
We need big game winners and we’re sadly lacking. Peter Lawwell needs to get s hold of Lennon so he says nothing until he’s had time to settle.
We seem not to have learned from Inverness last year to Kilmarnock last week.
Ref situ is a diversion. We should have been good enough to beat them regardless.
Time to grow up!
I did not expect anything less from the Orc in black at the bigot dome.
Murray clearly had NO intention of Celtic winning yesterday. On the playing front, Cha is a disaster waiting to happen. He has no sense of position.
I hope he and his fellow south Korean Ki are offloaded in the summer along with a few others.
Disagree about Ki .He has developed into a huge assest to Celtic and when he goes we will reap the rewards financially but he will missed.Cha however Iagree will not be a great loss.
Ki gave up chasing aluko yesterday it’s becoming his trade mark.
He’s a good player to have for friendlies or meaningless games, or if you want to sell shirts.
Not for when the chips ate down
I agree on one thing Marty, there was no way on this earth that Celtic were going to be allowed to win that game yesterday.
I believe that it would have been the death knell for rangers as far as their fans are concerned, to lose 4 consecutive games at ibrox and nothing to play for the rest of the season.
I think even the season ticket holders would find it hard to give ‘Fat Cuckold Ally’ their unwavering support as they have done for the worst rangers manager in my lifetime.
Mon the Hoops
Agree completety.Celtic Club and supporters will no longer quietly go away and say nothing.
In addition to your valid points,this Referee in my opinion throughout the game made little decisions in favour of Rangers which one by one were insignificant but collectively set the tone for the game.
Think about it Celtic were never going to win this game were they. The potential for violence if Rangers lost was real, considering the significance of a Rangers defeat.
There was no way ref was going to give us anything yesterday but we are doing ourselves no good by blaming him for the result.
Ten green bottlers yesterday and bizarre decisions re personnel and formation.
Ki shouldn’t be allowed to play competitive football, he can’t compete. Stopped running after Aluko left him but if he’d kept going he would’ve been able to intercept before ball got into box. He was same last week.
I asked about 40 mins in if Ledley was playing, think I saw him once after that.
Cha, happiest guy in the world but can’t defend and Mathhews stuck at left back.
If yesterday is of any benefit it should be to show us our limitations. Team excelled in turning round a massive deficit to win the league.
We need big game winners and we’re sadly lacking. Peter Lawwell needs to get s hold of Lennon so he says nothing until he’s had time to settle.
We seem not to have learned from Inverness last year to Kilmarnock last week.
Ref situ is a diversion. We should have been good enough to beat them regardless.
Time to grow up!
Agree with your points Gerry as we got exactly what we deserved out of yesterdays game but you have to vent!! It shows you how bad the man in black was when even Davy Provan is questioning his decision live of TV. Just in case Provan wasn’t on Sky yesterday I watched the game in the Middle East
Gerry your totally right Celtic should have wiped the floor with rangers even with 9 men and a ref giving us nothing. How about we all charge over to lennoxtown batter the whole team tell them the next game they have the cheek to lose with 9 men we will not be held accountable for our actions how about doing that. Some times it doesn’t matter how you play it was never going happen yesterday the forces of evil made sure of it.
How about we just man up for the next big game?
It’s a young team and they will improve, but there are not enough leaders in the park. Cup final was the same.
If you are happy enough with their attitude yesterday from kick off then fair enough.
I wasn’t. We lacked ragers desire we lacked Kilmarnock’s desire.
Something needs to change, it’s insanity to do the same thing over and again and expect a different outcome!
We never lost for 26 games before last week any team can win/lose a cup final there keeper was man of the match so we were unlucky last week another day we win 3 or 4 -1 and were all happy, yesterday we will never know if we could have won 11 v 11 because we never got the chance once cha was off we were up against it. This bottle thing is another Hun accusation the same as tainted title and paranoia. Hail hail
There was no way ref was going to give us anything yesterday but we are doing ourselves no good by blaming him for the result.
Ten green bottlers yesterday and bizarre decisions re personnel and formation.
Ki shouldn’t be allowed to play competitive football, he can’t compete. Stopped running after Aluko left him but if he’d kept going he would’ve been able to intercept before ball got into box. He was same last week.
I asked about 40 mins in if Ledley was playing, think I saw him once after that.
Cha, happiest guy in the world but can’t defend and Mathhews stuck at left back.
Lennon misrepresenting the ‘security’ issue is beyond embarrassing and yesterday’s defeat against a team in their knees is shambolic.
If yesterday is of any benefit it should be to show us our limitations. Team excelled in turning round a massive deficit to win the league.
We need big game winners and we’re sadly lacking. Peter Lawwell needs to get s hold of Lennon so he says nothing until he’s had time to settle.
We seem not to have learned from Inverness last year to Kilmarnock last week.
Ref situ is a diversion. We should have been good enough to beat them regardless.
Time to grow up!
In my opinion the MIB did little to influence the outcome yesterday. Dodgy decisions are a fact of life for Celtic and always have been but that doesn’t hide the truth – we simply were not up to the task yesterday. Rangers* were better than us all over the park. We let ourselves down when it really mattered yet again. This isn’t coincidence, it’s pattern. For some unknown reason, Lenny can’t seem to get the central message that we have to compete physically and mentally on these occasions across to his team. I have no idea why. We have better players than Rangers*, Kilmarnock, Sion, Utrecht, Ross County Inverness et all but can’t seem to beat them, in a single game, when it really matters. It’s mind boggling because we know the ability is there – the brilliant run since being 3-0 at half time to the Ayrshire Huns demonstrated that.
Anyway, we’ll get over yesterday and win the league soon enough.
KTF
(*In Administration (never tire of writing that!))
to my namesake i guess you’ve started following celtic quite recently
Great spot! Got me bang to rights!
Whitt-attacker should have had an early shower, victors tackle was naive but it was a loose ball and no way did he even get close to the boy to hurt him, yellow card at best but can see in the heat of the moment a red card was given.
Also the game was cut a little short, it’s a min of 4 mins added time and it was under, just as Celtic had the break of the ball. The second goal was marginally for the offside I thought it was as soon as I saw it you’d expect the linesman to get the big decisions.
Cha’s was never a sending off ands it’s debatable whether its even a freekick, That said cha should have learned his lesson earlier from being out of position, he was caught once again and if he’s been told to push on then the center backs must cover the space.
Game was lost before we even kicked a ball. Cha has shown time and again he cannot be trusted in the big games. should never have been on the park esp with Izaguirre on bench. another puzzling team selection from Lenny.
Like it or not as soon as Cha puts his hand on wallaces shoulder he forces the ref to make a decision and with 43,000 orcs baying for blood ref was always gonna show a red. BTW it is a red, despite wallace going down easy, ref doesn’t take account of someones scoring record. bottom line is if wallace gets away from Cha he is in the box able to have a free shot at Forster, Mulgrew is in middle of box but doesn’t count as hes never gonna block the shot in time and space available.
Yeah Wanyama won the ball but it is a 2 footed challenge with straight legs off the ground, a leg breaker if it goes wrong and a stone wall red card. orcs 2nd goal yeah offside, I too thought Matthews was fouled at 3rd goal. as for other matters haven’t seen them as only seen highlights.
Hopefully we’ll get shot of Cha in the summer, he’s a liability. BTW I am a qualified referee and a cellic fan (there are a few of us!!) but not SPL standard!!
Stevo ‘not being SPL class’ means that you are a genuine first class referee then….
No good having the skill and the ability to take a team like Rangers apart only to expect your team mates to do all the work…
The one key thing that is missing from the Celtic team just now is ‘the work ethic’. They do not put in a hard shift of work with the killer determination that is required in the SPL. Once that is restored we will sweep all aside!