Gary McAllister has claimed that Jon Flanagan’s clash with Scott Brown was ‘a coming together’.
The Ibrox defender is up in front of the SFA today to appeal against the retrospective red card that he picked up following Sunday’s Glasgow derby that rules him out of Sunday’s match at Kilmarnock..
Most pundits agreed that Flanagan had got away with one, in the Daily Record Barry Ferguson explained.
It was a red-card offence. Take your medicine and get on with it. What else did they think was going to happen?
Now I’m the last guy to defend the SFA’s disciplinary department. I’ve made my views clear on that already because there’s been no rhyme or reason to the way the compliance officer has been acting this season.
It’s getting to the point where players will be scared to breathe on one another during a match in case they’re dragged up to her office the next day. The whole procedure has got completely out of hand.
I can’t blame Rangers for getting annoyed about that. They have every right to be but in this instance the SFA were 100 per cent right to haul up Flanagan.
McAllister viewed it very differently.
Gary McAllister says Flanagan only deserved a yellow, calling it a ‘coming together’ with Brown.
He hopes the ‘penny’s dropped’ for Morelos in terms of discipline after missing out on Colombia’s Copa America squad.
Arfield and Katic have been allowed to go on holiday early. pic.twitter.com/GJJFKLYowQ
— Superscoreboard (@ClydeSSB) May 17, 2019
Fortunately Brown was able to recover and complete the match alongside Flanagan who only picked up a yellow card. The appeal is being heard by the SFA today with referee Kevin Clancy appointed as one of the additional assistants for next Saturday’s Scottish Cup Final.
In the previous Glasgow derby Ryan Kent appealed against, and lost, a retrospective suspension after he punched Brown after James Forrest scored the decisive third goal of the game.
The Flanagan case is the sixth time this season that the Compliance Officer has stepped in to take retrospective action for incidents not sufficiently punished by match referees.
While the offender sits out matches through suspension there is no benefit to Celtic who have had to play against someone that should have been ordered off.
