Charlie Richmond has lifted the lid on the old boys network inside Scottish refereeing.
Steven McLean and John Beaton are both having nightmare seasons but when the best that the next generation has to offer is Kevin Clancy it’s easy to see why the current elite are untouchable.
Within a span of seven Premiership matches Celtic had Bobby Madden referee three matches with the Lanarkshire based whistler taking charge of successive matches involving the hoops, Aberdeen and Sevco.
With an in-house network of supervisors and delegate jobs on the go it’s rare for referees to break rank but while his dislike for Neil Lennon is barely concealed Richmond can speak out and explain how the inner workings of refereeing is determined inside the SFA.
Speaking to the Daily Record he said: “Overall the standard of refereeing in Scotland is poor at the moment and part of the reason for that is there is no succession plan.
“The top guys are getting away with making mistakes because they are not being pushed enough.
“The likes of Craig Thomson, Steven McLean and John Beaton might not be refereeing so well but they don’t care because they are not going to be held to account for it.
“They will stay in charge of the biggest games because there is no one good enough coming through to push them down the pecking order.
“UEFA stipulates that your top guys do the top games and at the moment there’s not enough talent coming through to put these guys under threat and create competition.
“That’s the fault of the system. We’re firing young guys through the ranks too quickly, while stunting the progress of other officials whose faces maybe don’t fit quite so well.
“Are the SFA going too far when they’re looking to recruit referees at 17 years old into a system where if you’re not in the Premier League by the time you’re 24 and on the FIFA list by 27 you’re classified as too old?”
At the moment when a top referee is going through an especially dismal period he’ll find himself dropped down to League One for a few matches then re-introduced to the top flight through some non-televised fixtures.