He’s got to go- Sportscene expert calls for Bitton red card

Celtic’s win over Hearts had plenty of talking points but in among five other Premiership matches Richard Foster and BBC Sportscene felt that a potential red card for Nir Bitton was a major talking point. 

The Celtic captain was booked in the 53rd minute for the sort of run-of-the-mill challenge that John Beaton had allowed to pass without needing to produce a card. 

Cammy Devlin and Craig Halkett had both committed similar or worse fouls during the first half. When Devlin got cautioned for his third foul shortly before half-time he managed to take Greg Taylor and Jota into the book with him. 

Already on a yellow card, Bitton did deliberately handle the ball but the other Beaton, the one with a whistle, decided that a free kick was all that was required- which was the prompt for Foster’s anger on last night’s Sportscene. 

The Sun reports: 

Foster reckons Bitton should have walked by the letter of the law – even though he has his doubts over whether the Israeli should have been cautioned in the first instance.

He said: “By the rules I think yes (he should). Deliberate handball is a yellow card.

“For the first yellow, I actually don’t think he does anything wrong there. He’s trying to actually pull himself out of the way and the Hearts player goes down and it’s a booking.”

Referencing the second clip, Foster said: “It’s a deliberate handball. For me, this is definitely a booking and he’s got to go.” 

Beaton booked three players from each side in his first Celtic Premiership match of the season.