With refereeing integrity put in the spotlight this week there seems to be a clamour for transparency and accountability.
MSP James Dornan has led a call from Holyrood which puts in the spotlight an incredible 74 match run without conceding a penalty in the SPFL.
A month into the introduction of VAR there was a very strange incident at Fir Park as Celtic visited, one that forced the SFA into a strangely worded statement and explanation which referenced being offside when the ball was received, not when it was played as stated by the Laws of the Game.
Kyogo Furuhashi’s pass opened up the Motherwell defence, it also opened up a can of worms at the SFA relating to VAR that has never been answered, unfortunately it was yet another matter that Michael ‘Penalty for Rangers’ Nicholson had no interest in getting answers to.
Jota scored a brilliant ‘goal’ running onto the ball, drawing Liam Kelly then dinking the ball into the net to set off an unlikely series of events.
Interesting thing…
Kris Boyd confirmed the Jota goal was onside some time later when he was trying to justify what looked like a Sakala offside goal being given at Motherwell.Did David Dickinson on VAR that night, lie?
Were the pics incorrect?Maybe we all back Dornan? https://t.co/LOC5Ci8tbL pic.twitter.com/a33017RWrJ
— Lint (@Zeshankenzo) January 6, 2024
The match was shown by Motherwell TV with confusion over the decision as Willie Collum waited on the VAR verdict on a possible offside.
Without the proper camera angles David Dickinson decided to go with the offside flagged by the linesman once the ball had hit the back of the net.
Nothing was mentioned immediately after the match or the following day, but two days later after various rumours had surfaced plus tweets from Motherwell CEO Alan Burrows the SFA decided to go public with their version of events.
Covering a match at Fir Park later in the season Kris Boyd confirmed that the wrong decision had been made on the Jota ‘goal’.
Given the current level of hysteria over VAR related issues surely it would make sense for Celtic to support moves to introduce transparency by broadcasting VAR conversations over contentious decisions.
Knowing that it will no longer be kept secret might force Dickinson to think twice before letting his heart rule his head.
It was only confirmed that the camera had malfunctioned a day or two later.
AFTER they tried to palm everyone off with a pic to confirm the offside from the other side of the stadium, not before.
When they were pushed as to why, THEN the camera story.David Dickinson on VAR. https://t.co/wqkf2g5WPG pic.twitter.com/SrWVlv7qzH
— Lint (@Zeshankenzo) January 6, 2024
They just make the rules up as they go along…
It always WAS thus –
And always WILL be thus !