Members of the Celtic hierarchy are reported to be ‘privately seething’ about the way that the SFA have handled the John Fleck situation.
The Scotland squad flew to Spain on Friday but on Tuesday the Sheffield United midfielder returned a positive test that Steve Clarke claimed had a 99.5% likelihood of being picked up before the squad flew out.
In that case Fleck’s close contacts while training, travelling and dining during Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday need to be identified and forced to self-isolate.
On Tuesday the Scotland squad flew to Portugal for a friendly with Holland with no mention of six players remaining behind with Fleck. There was no media coverage of the squad flying out of Alicante or arriving in Faro.
At lunchtime on Wednesday news emerged about the six other players with the word from the SFA being that a decision to split the squad was simply a precaution.
In January Celtic were unhappy when 13 players had to self-isolate as contacts of Chris Jullien who tested positive on the way back from Dubai. Neil Lennon claimed that the protocols had been observed before different rules were applied.
Reacting to the Scotland situation The Sun claims:
It’s understood members of the Parkhead hierarchy are privately seething that Scotland’s situation is being looked on differently.
Unless someone from Celtic, notably Peter Lawwell, wishes to go public with questions about double standards being privately seething means very little.
Scotland fly to Luxembourg for another friendly on Sunday with little known about the squad and their movements with the line being that they are complying with the protocols of the Spanish authorities.
Celtic supply six of the 26 man Scotland squad, none of them were left out of the squad that flew to Portugal to face Holland.