Sky Sports have virtually ignored Celtic’s match with Hearts tonight despite having live coverage of Sunday’s trip to Pittodrie for Neil Lennon’s side.
Relations between the broadcaster and Celtic have gone downhill since an interview with Alfredo Morelos was broadcast with fake subtitles claiming that Celtic fans had made racist comments at the striker.
The answers were all given in Spanish with no mention made of Celtic.
After Sky Sports apologised and deleted the interview Celtic contacted Ofcom and issued a follow up statement requesting information on a number of aspects about the interview that was highly detrimental to the club. Next season Sky Sports begin an exclusive five year deal for SPFL Premiership football.
Yesterday Celtic refused Sky Sports access to their media conferences to preview tonight’s game with Hearts.
The Sky Scotland twitter feed mentioned Odsonne Edouard picking up the January Player of the Month award with the same prominence given to Gary Holt getting the manager award and Ross Wallace joining St Mirren.
On their Celtic webpage there is an agency story on Edouard’s award, a report from Monday about Jackie McNamara and also a report on ‘Old Firm racism charge for 12-year-old boy.
The next test in the stand off will be Sunday’s live match at Pittodrie. Celtic could continue to blank the broadcaster or put up a player and coach to give one word answers for the broadcaster who has exclusive access for their live fixtures.
BBC Scotland are currently in dispute with Dave King’s club but still provide extensive coverage through agency stories and contributions from Ibrox friendly pundits such as Neil McCann, Billy Dodds, Steven Thompson, Derek Ferguson and Alex Rae.
Last night Sky Sports provided 15 minutes of coverage before kick off for the Hamilton v Aberdeen match which they showed live with just Kris Boyd to offer expert opinion.