What is it all about with Police Service Northern Ireland?
Three weeks ago the body former out of the Royal Ulster Constabulary informed us that they couldn’t police a football match on July 11 or 14 but could do so on the 14th with an earlier kick off.
Celtic could have dug their heels in and insisted that the game is played as scheduled even if it required a 10am kick off since the PSNI couldn’t handle an evening kick off.
The hoops went along with the Friday kick off and alienated a number of supporters by altering the fixture list to allow the host city to celebrate their hatred of Catholics.
It also messed up Celtic’s pre-season plans with Brendan Rodgers missing out on a valuable pre-season friendly against Lyon that would sharpen up his squad for the much tougher third qualifying round of the Champions League- a tournament that can generate around 30% of Celtic’s income for the season.
Despite accommodating the host city and their poisonous ‘traditions’ Celtic find themselves in the spotlight this morning.
Linfield have been happy to take ticket money from anyone and everyone, the only restriction was online where only BT post codes could buy tickets.
A major problem, has now been created for tomorrow’s match, how do you accommodate hundreds or thousands of Celtic fans inside Windsor Park?
Yesterday on the date that they couldn’t cope with a football match someone within PSNI decided to pour petrol on the flames.
— PSNI (@PoliceServiceNI) July 12, 2017
Who benefits from that comment?
Comment from Celtic Football Club: “We are extremely surprised by this statement and the timing of the release.” 1/3
— Celtic Football Club (@celticfc) July 12, 2017
“This is clearly not our understanding of the situation and we stand by our statement of 23rd June.” 2/3
— Celtic Football Club (@celticfc) July 12, 2017
“We feel there is nothing to be gained by commenting further until the tie has been played.” 3/3
— Celtic Football Club (@celticfc) July 12, 2017
Rather than trying to keep a lid on a difficult situation another factor has been thrown in.
If there is trouble at the match tomorrow blame will be pointed at Celtic for not taking tickets to the game.
Rather than trying to keep law and order, something absent from yesterday’s parades perhaps PSNI should look internally at who decided on that tweet and what benefit it provided.