Celtic were the victims of an outrageous VAR decision during their 2-0 defeat at home to Braga tonight.
It was a night of complete misery on and off the park as the Portuguese side eased their way to victory, taking full advantage of a ‘bizarre’ decision given against Kelechi Iheanacho in the 53rd minute.
After a promising start from Celtic with most of their play channeled down the left through Sebastian Tounekti Braga took control midway through the first half without carving out any great chances.
Kasper Schmeichel’s distribution was causing some concern but in the 20th minute he completely lost the flight of a shot from Ricardo Horta which found the net from 33 yards out.
Kelechi Iheanacho looked to have gotten Celtic back into the game… but VAR rules out his strike for handball ?
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Early in the second half it looked like Celtic had got themselves back on level terms after Iheanacho took advantage of some slack defending.
Gus Lagerbielke’s clearance was controlled by the former Leicester striker who took two touches then found the net.
The routine VAR check seemed to drag on, coverage from TNT Sport showed the ball flying up, perhaps grazing Iheanacho’s shoulder then forehead as he moved forward to score.
Joe Hart was amazed at the delay then astonished by the outcome, the goal was disallowed with the referee pointing to an area above the t-shirt line to justify his decision.
In the 85th minute Gabri Martinez deflected a Dane Murray clearance into the net as thousands headed for the exits.
It was the fifth time in their last nine matches that Celtic have failed to score, tonight they could point to a massive miscarriage of justice that denied them an equaliser against Braga.
With one point from two Europa League matches and tougher opponents ahead Celtic face a real battle to avoid finishing in the bottom of eight and an early exit from the competition.
CLICK HERE for UEFA details on Celtic’s defeat to Braga.
CLICK HERE for Nicholson caves into social media for
Haven’t seen anything of the game yet,
but had noticed earlier that Braga was mid-table in the Portuguese league,
with only 1 win out of their last 7 matches.
Looks a really poor result – and a sobering reality check for BR and the team…?
Showed 3 different angles of the so called hand ball, in no way did it touch his arm.
No idea what VAR saw, but it was enough to not even let the ref look at it?
Shocking decision.
Tbf tho, we were just as shocking.
Worst squad I’ve seen for as long as I can remember.
Calmac is done, Maeda is done, Hatate came on for 25mins and looked gubbed after 10.
This squad lacks cohesion.
They are not a team.
Shocking VAR decision…and our midfield is shockingly inept. Weak,lacking drive,creativity,imagination and belief,as are Brendans tactics.
Full reset required in my opinion…and a few out there tonight try every game but just aren’t very good.
Deserved fck all. No plan b. Just the same psh every game. Time up Rodgers.
I don’t think he’s interested any more – in fact, I think he’s been preparing his exit from the day he came back. 3million a year for three years and then a nice early retirement to the Spanish costas. The guy is a charlatan and always has been.
Editor: Thoughts please on the £1m a year hologram employed as CEO please?
£3m and he’s standing on the touchline daydreaming
Same with the players
The fans are being cheated from top to bottom
Editor: Any thoughts on the £1m a year CEO trying to sell off all players or the Chairman with a network of messengers slaughtering all players signed since September 2023?
Yes editor but the CEO doesn’t put the team out and arrange tactics or not as it turned out,we are as piss poor as sevco and the dons in every European competition, Scottish football is dire, don’t know when it went wrong but we were pish in Europe once again,I hate this board of shysters but surely we’ve got to play with what we’ve got and it’s out the boards hands , even though they left us threadbare but it’s getting we can’t beat anyone anymore unless it’s piss poor SPFL shite but after Hibs we can’t even do that,so who’s to blame now?
Yes the VAR decision was a travesty but it proves we can’t just blame biased Scottish refs, unless that ref was a sevco fan,this result shows us how bad we are and Scottish football in general,Braga a mid table Portuguese team and we can’t beat them at home , blame VAR all we like but it doesn’t retract from the fact that we’re not nearly as good as we think we are ,thank fuck we’re not in the CL,I noticed kairat got 5 put past them and we couldn’t put 1 past them,what would that make us look like in Europe.