HAMILTON, SCOTLAND - JANUARY 28: Head of Referee Operations Willie Collum during a William Hill Championship match between Hamilton Academical and Raith Rovers at the ZLX Stadium, on January 28, 2025, in Hamilton, Scotland. (Photo by Roddy Scott/SNS Group via Getty Images)
For the second match running Celtic were denied justice by SFA match officials.
Leading 1-0 midway through the second half Sebastian Tounekti hung a ball over beyond the far past towards Kasper Hogh.
As the Dane headed the ball back Haissem Hassan shot across goal into the net.
After the briefest of VAR checks the on field decision stood to disallow the ‘goal’ based on the judgement of the linesman who flagged before the incident was completed.
Later in the coverage from Sky Sports an explanation was given.
Ian Crocker revealed that since the VAR coverage had lost flight of the ball the decision was taken to go with the on-field decision.
On one hand it highlights the low grade VAR in use in the SPFL.
More importantly it totally contradicts the outcome of an incident during Celtic’s win against St Mirren.
2 goals in 2 games wrongly disallowed but aye all the refs are on our side. ?
— Nish (@nisith1974) September 9, 2026
TWO BIG VAR CALLS- BOTH GO AGAINST CELTIC
When there was no evidence against a ‘goal’ from Shim Mheuka the officials decided to go AGAINST the on-field decision.
Looking at a still image that proved absolutely nothing match referee Ryan Lee decided to disallow the goal that he and his assistant had allowed.
Fortunately Celtic held on to claim three points thanks to Mika Baur’s goal.
Had the Hassan ‘goal’ been allowed to stand it would have made for a far more relaxed last 20 minutes.
At 1-0 St Johnstone were always in with a chance of equalising.
Grant Irvine from Boclair Academy was on VAR duty.
It seems that on a Saturday on field decisions can be over turned without any evidence. Tonight the officials decided to stick with the decision on the pitch.
Since Saturday there has been no explanation of briefing from Willie Collum at the SFA.
Matched only by the meek acceptance of Celtic on any decisions from the SFA, a stance that the club has followed since July 2012.
Next up for Celtic is a League Cup quarter-final at Ibrox with Andrew Dallas and Steven McLean on VAR duty.
Watched it … Even Boyd says it was a goal. Abysmal standards.
VAR was correct today if they could not prove anything. Just makes the St Mirren decision more unjustified
So what’s to stop them on Sunday just saying that var didn’t work or did work depending on how it’s gonna benefit Sevco…
Martin simply HAS to highlight this when he does his conference for The Scummy’s on Friday or Saturday !
It’s fu**in awful but MON has joined the tories and tossers on the board.
And at CP that’s not new.
However, Jock Stein, a protestant refused to be silent and called out cheating matters as much as he could. This cost him family and ‘friendships’ which the Big Mhan called out too.
“True family, friends and individuals would not treat me like this. I’m better off without them.” (or words to that effect)
Get used to it,this is them trying to REDEEM themselves from last season
And it’s working 6 games played they have F***”D up at least 2 of those games with TICKLY HANDSHAKE decisions.