Honestly Shocking- the John Beaton files start to unravel

It started with the highly out of sync statistics for free kicks that revealed Celtic had committed 23 fouls in the Glasgow Derby and received just 10 free kicks from John Beaton.

From 46% possession of the ball Celtic committed more than twice as many free kicks. 

One of the free kicks that Celtic were reluctantly awarded was for the attack on Tomoki Iwata by Tom Lawrence that led to Cyriel Dessers putting the ball in the net. VAR reviewed the incident and called it back for a foul despite Beaton being just yards away and having a clear view of the contact.

Fabio Silva’s theatrics and simulation has attracted most of the post match attention with the compliant legacy media praising Beaton for getting the big decisions right while ignoring the fact that VAR had to get involved after the man from Bellshill got it wrong in real time.

There is a reason that no Scottish referees will be anywhere near the European Championship Finals in Germany this summer.

Fortunately, these days we have social media to provide the sort of awkward coverage and analysis that frightens old media. Such as two of the incidents below.

Those clips summarise Beaton with Sunday’s display entirely predictable.

A dangerous swipe at Kyogo Furuhashi by Scott Wright goes unpunished, Beaton is probably praised for letting the game flow.

When a panic stricken Connor Goldson realises he is in trouble from Matt O’Riley he falls to the ground with no contact and grabs the ball as an insurance policy. Beaton was on the scene quickly to award a free-kick.

Crawford Allan has six more rounds of appointments to make before moving on to fresh opportunities, Beaton will almost certainly referee one Celtic match and be on VAR for another.

Don Robertson is expected to be put in charge of the post split Derby match at Celtic Park with Nick Walsh held over to referee a likely Scottish Cup Final.

From the free kick against O’Riley the home side almost scored, football matches are regularly decided by small margins.

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