For the second successive round of SPFL Premiership fixtures Alan Muir will be absent from VAR duties.
On Saturday he was at the centre of controversy for disallowing a ‘goal’ scored by Daizen Maeda that was allowed by referee Steven McLean and his assistant David Roome.
After a short check the goal was disallowed because Alistair Johnston had cut the ball back from over the bye-line. Premier Sports were unable to produce an image to back up the decision.
Speaking after the match The Sun reports Brendan Rodgers saying:
My take is that the official Alan Muir has had a guess at it. The linesman arguably has the best view in the stadium and he doesn’t give it. So for that to get overturned I am assuming there is an absolute clear image of the ball being out of play.
In my experience up here with VAR, you don’t have all the angles and they don’t have the equipment to say it was conclusively out. So you are actually viewing it from a secondary position and at that point you are then having a guess. That is the huge disappointment.
More than two days later no image has appeared to justify the decision, Head of Refereeing Willie Collum hasn’t made any comment.
The SFA waited until Monday morning before announcing the officials for six midweek matches, Muir wasn’t included.
This weekend Andrew Dallas will be on VAR duties for two matches, Celtic v St Mirren on Saturday then Aberdeen v Dundee United the following day, Muir, one of three full-time VAR officials hasn’t been selected for any of the six fixtures.
Over the weekend Nick Walsh, Kevin Clancy, Gavin Duncan and John Beaton will be on VAR duty which results on a knock on effect with the refereeing pool a man short since others are stepping up with Muir unavailable.
The following weekend there are four televised Scottish Cup tie, Collum will have to decide whether to put Muir back on duty or to delay a decision on his return following his decision to disallow a ‘goal’ from Maeda against Hibs.
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Brendan Rodgers is “hugely disappointed” with the decision to disallow Celtic’s goal today that would have made it 2-2 against Hibernian ?
“My experience here with VAR is that they don’t have all the angles or equipment to say it’s conclusively out.” ??#HIBCEL pic.twitter.com/P4SIiTEcm9
— Premier Sports (@PremSportsTV) February 22, 2025
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He just didn’t want to give Celtic the goal he let his colleagues down for personal reasons should be made an example of anybody gets personal should not be allowed to make judgements muir has to go
He has duplicated what he did to Sevco after The League Cup Final then by dropping them…
Well almost –
He’s not desperately ran out on the Monday to pacify Brendan the way he did for Fillipe Fillop…
And he fuckin won’t either the snivelling little yellow bastard of a Sevco pacifying coward that he is !
The SFA really are sending out a strong message to us! Andrew Dallas is quite simply the most bigoted anti-Celtic cheat in Scottish football today. He has proven time after time that he is 100% anti-Celtic in his calls, just as his father was before him. For the SFA to be pulling out the stops like this to assist the establishment now is nothing short of disgraceful and disgusting. But it is glaringly obvious and expected too.
They are showing the American investment group just what they can expect for support when the money in invested into their club across the city for next season.
So it looks like the corruption team at the SFA rolls on!