Time constraints- Sky Sports pundit adds unconvincing explanation over Abada decision

Andy Walker has added further confusion to the controversial launch of VAR to Scottish football.

The former Celtic striker was co-commentator at Tynecastle on Saturday as Celtic and Hearts shared seven goals and a couple of VAR flashpoints.

Michael Smith incrediblly avoided seeing a penalty awarded against him when he raised his arm to block a pass from James Forrest with neither referee Nick Walsh or VAR Steven McLean prepared to give the award.

In the closing minutes Liel Abada had the ball in the Hearts net but assistant referee David Roome raised his flag for offside. No VAR lines were produced to justify the decision adding to the frustrations of Celtic supporters.

Asked about the penalty claim against Smith and the Abada decision Walker told Go Radio (8 minutes):

I was really strange (the penalty). And then the one at the end with Abada. I mean, he was offside. I think there was some sort of time constraints in our programme we didn’t manage to get the lines out, but it was definitely offside.

Once the final whistle blew Sky Sports coverage of the match continued for around 20 minutes.

Both managers were interviewed, in the studio James McFadden, John Hartson and Ryan McGowan discussed the big decisions from the match.

When Lawrence Shankland scored his second goal Sky were able to show VAR lines quite soon afterwards.

During the build up to the introduction of VAR the SFA made it clear that every goal would be checked to ensure that there had been no infringements.

It seems very strange that the lines that allowed McLean to disallow the goal weren’t instantly available to Sky Sports which would have prevented a week of speculation about whether Abada was on or offside.