GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - APRIL 07: Referee John Beaton and Willie Collum during a cinch Premiership match between Rangers and Celtic at Ibrox Stadium, on April 07, 2024, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Craig Williamson/SNS Group via Getty Images)
Barely a month into the season the VAR system in use from the SFA has become as big a joke as Willie Collum.
Pre-season the Head of Refereeing called in his favourite messengers to explain how wonderful everything was inside Scottish refereeing.
Fans had just witnessed the World Cup Finals.
While a few decisions were skewered towards favoured nations by and large fans could watch the matches knowing that virtually every decision would be backed up by evidence.
Every offside would be demonstrated with 3D imagery, if the ball went in or out of play the images would be provided to back the final decision.
And then we get back to the farce that is Scottish football.
Rabbit-in-headlights Matthew MacDermit refereed the match between St Johnstone and Celtic.
From the Glasgow Refereeing Association Chris Gentles was selected as a linesman.
Watching on VAR was Grant Irvine, today he is back at his day job working on the fitness and education of the Murray Park starlets at Boclair Academy.
You don’t need AI to work out what Gentles and Irvine will be doing at 12 noon on Sunday.
So we’re told VAR is calibrated, so the angle doesn’t matter.
Draw the lines on the ball and the byline then ???? pic.twitter.com/d0usgkf01j
— Frankity Frank ???????? (@gIaikit) September 9, 2026
Put MacDermid, Gentles and Irvine together and you get decisions like last night in Perth.
At no point was the cross from Sebastian Tounekti out the park.
There is a decent debate that at no time was any of the ball out the park.
Gentles flagged, MacDermid blew his whistle, VAR didn’t follow the ball and this week the on-field decision stands.
Unlike Saturday when Don Robertson over-ruled the on pitch decision.
COLLUM CAN OFFER NO DEFENCE OF HIS CHRONIC, NOT FIT FOR PURPOSE SET UP
Collum has been silent since Saturday.
On Friday Sky Sports will screen The Willie Show for the first time this season.
That scripted deflection exercise with Gordon Duncan who was rewarded by the SFA in the summer with a jolly to the World Cup Finals, staying five star with the Scotland squad.
Collum already had a difficult task bailing Robertson out of his role in the match against St Mirren.
Now he has the decision making of Gentles to defend against a backdrop of VAR that isn’t close to being functional.
Celtic fans are used to decisions going in a certain direction after generations of domination from the Lanarkshire Referees Association.
Hugh Dallas took things even further, now he has Collum cloning officials in his image.
A sub-standard VAR set up is only part of the problem.
The real issue is the officials selected by Collum, their highly subjective decision making and the complete absence of any level of accountability.
Where’s the outrage from the national sports media?
Oh…wait a minute…it’s not affecting Sevco.
If this isn’t the final straw for VAR in the SPL I genuinely don’t know just how bad it has to be.
I get that the linesman gave the ball out, and in any normal situation that would be accepted, but how on earth has he GIVEN THAT AS OUT?
What has he actually seen?
It’s so obviously NOT OUT, and he has seen it as out??
He shouldn’t be near a line ever again if his decision making is that poor, if he’s guessed then that’s even worse, if it’s dark arts then that needs addressed to, but as we all know, nothing will be done.
Here’s a thought also…..could we all be witnessing a DELIBERATE MISUSE OF VAR in an attempt to get rid of it as it does, regardless of what we all think , hold the MiB to some form of professional standard.
It’s no coincidence that Celtic have become the force they have in the last 30 years since the onset of live games constantly on TV with heavy analysis and scrutiny then the introduction of VAR.
That has obliterated the influence that the MiB would have had in previous decades where they would have made decisions with impunity.
That explains the lack of trophies for Sevco as much as any other event does.
We may be witnessing the MiB surreptitiously trying to get VAR out of the equation by getting US THE FANS to demand it’s end.
Why wasn’t the ref asked by var to go look at it like the weekend (apart from the fact that is NOT the policy?). Making it up as they go along this mob