GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - OCTOBER 03: Rangers Manager Philippe Clement shakes hands with James Tavernier as he substituted during a UEFA Europa League Matchday Two League Phase match between Rangers and Olympique Lyonnais at Ibrox Stadium, on October 03, 2024, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Craig Williamson/SNS Group via Getty Images)
Earlier this year he was celebrating becoming the highest scoring defender in British football.
With just one goal to his name in November it seems that Ibrox fans have had enough of James Tavernier with derision and anger growing game by game.
After his involvement in Aberdeen’s winning goal at Pittodrie the former Wigan ace told a media conference that he was pleased with his form this season.
Two days later at Hampden bears were howling for their captain to be removed, preferably permanently but at least by a substitution.
When they got their wish it was met with one of the biggest cheers of the day, so what has changed for the man known by fans across Scotland as Tavpen?
Yeah, Tav has ‘lost a yard of pace’ since Crawford Allan left. https://t.co/OtaHDHdoY8
— Lint (@Zeshankenzo) November 4, 2024
The blunt answer is a change at the SFA with Crawford Allan no longer Head of Refereeing.
After five remarkable years when red cards and penalty differentials went off the radar things have normalised under new Head of Refereeing Willie Collum.
Andrew Dallas, Greg Aitken and Alan Muir are still levelling up with their squiggly lines and bizarre penalty decisions but on the pitch the match referees are edging towards applying the Laws of the Game in the same way as officials across Europe.
If they want included on the lucrative international scene Scottish referees will have to get used to applying the Laws in the same manner in every fixture, levelling up is out.
A year ago with Phil Clement appointed Tav scored eight goals in nine matches following the sacking of Micky Beale, in Scotland this sort of freaky run is described as ‘new manager bounce’.
This season the veteran defender has scored once in 18 matches.
Without the penalties there seems little point in playing a bang average journeyman who quietly celebrated his 33rd birthday last week without a word of congratulations from his employer.
Clement now appears to be phasing out his penalty taker, in mid December the Belgian Beale faces Spurs and Celtic over four days, sticking with Tavernier for those matches could be termed an act of cruelty.
Rangers extraordinary league penalty differential over the years:
Crawford Allan:
2020-21
+92021-22
+72022-23
+102023-24
+12————————-
Willie Collum:
2024-25
-2 https://t.co/pMFCu37M1R— Lint (@Zeshankenzo) November 3, 2024
How many Champions League points will Celtic get?
8 or less
9 points
10 points
More than 10!
Joe , when they attempted to put B R in his ” place” when he called out cheatin beaston and he ripped them a new one when celtic tooled up with legal representation at their meeting , all changed , and changed forever .
The penalties stopped immediately , the down fall of sevco was they employed second rate managers who relied on the corrupt cabal of officials to see them through on results in their favour from the usual penalty or playing against 10 men , imagine , little dullass , getting away with 4 pens in one game ? they lost the plot ,
No one will tell me that the bluffer beale turned down wolves job for sevco with out an ulterior motive , and that was to cheat celtic to win the league with the help of the black ops mebuckos and get offers down south akin to Ange , he’d be set up for life , we have B R to thank for many things , but for me it started with allen getting his jotters no matter what way you look at it
Editor: Celtic tooled up? Nicholson? Lawwell? I remember it differently. Did you see Beaton refereeing the 3-3 match at Ibrox? He single handedly brought him back into that match and got the first Glasgow Derby of this season to keep a lid on things.
Celtic are tooled up in the boardroom all right, full of them.
He’s being doing Celtic for as long as he’s been able , but after Rodgers , No penalties agin ross county motherwell or dundee, 8 points dropped , we all know of the board’s position , but they were forced to defend Rodgers against beaston ,and it’s widely presumed they brought a warning to the meeting of the cost to celtic and scottish soccer if they were blatantly robbed of the league by beaston and co , or maybe the black op boyos got a fit of remorse ? good luck with that yarn !!!
Certainly been a shift in attitude towards referee behaviour since Allan moved on, there still is a significant amount of dubious decisions going against us !
I’m sure we wouldn’t want the Bun board doing our books as we all know that they are in free fall on all sides and we are very much in the Black so our board must be doing something right
Joe you’re forgetting that Celtic had Nick De Marco representing BR at that hearing.
Editor: Apparently our CEO is a top Sports Lawyer, so far he has been a chocolate teapot in all matters with the SFA who know every detail of July 2012 and the fat fingerprints all over it.
These stats are truly astonishing indeed…
As always Celtic will be as silent as nearby Janefield Cemetery of course !
Michael Crawford and / or Dave Allen could have made a more serious attempt at the job than Crawford Allen did!