Hypocrites With Typewriters
The Scottish press … you really have to hand it to them.
They have spent the last week accusing Celtic of paranoia for daring to question a scandalous refereeing decision.
In doing so, they also lambasted Peter Lawwell, with some of them going so far as to suggest that he rethink his position at the SFA.
The logic of it is beautiful, isn’t it?
If you’re an official who supports Sevco, you can carry on with your job as normal.
You can officiate whichever games you like and if bad decisions are made, well that happens.
Because officials (or perhaps just Sevco fans) are honest and incorruptible, right?
But if you’re the CEO of Celtic you ought not to be holding down a senior position in the governance of our game … because your primary role automatically makes you biased.
Doesn’t it make you want to scream?
Forget, for a moment, that all Peter Lawwell is being asked to do on the SFA board, whenever he has to make a decision on the future of Sevco, is make sure that the regulations are applied to them as would be applied to everyone else.
If someone can point to one instance where that hasn’t been the case, where he’s let his own club’s interests come first, I’ll buy that person a steak dinner.
It doesn’t stop the innuendo.
It doesn’t stop the sly digs.
It certainly hasn’t prevented scribbling halfwits from casting all sorts of aspersions on his suitability.
These same people, incidentally, have given no scrutiny whatsoever to the likes of Campbell Ogilvie (who’s scandalous tenure as President of the SFA is the subject of On Fields of Green’s latest article) and are leading the “Dave King For Sevco Chairman” fan club although he fails on at least two counts of the SFA’s fit and proper person criteria.
Salient details, and facts, tend not to matter to these people.
Today, they’re at it again, this time trying to demonise a new member of the SFA Board before his feet are even properly under the table.
The Daily Record, the very same newspaper that has screamed “paranoia” every time Celtic has made a statement in defence of its interests, is running a truly lamentable headline about Gary Hughes, whose appointment just been announced, with the “story” that he once said his ambition was to see his son play for the Parkhead club.
He now carries into his responsibilities the sobriquet “self-confessed Celtic fan.”
He might as well not bother unpacking his pencils. This is just the start of it.
(By the way, their headline writer couldn’t even get his name right. They called him Gavin in the headline and Gary in the article. Gavin, as it turns out, is the name of his son.)
His every move will now be scrutinised for signs of bias by the very people who consistently deny that any of that exists in the administration of the Scottish game.
For the record, I am glad his allegiance is on the record, put there, in fact, by a national newspaper.
It’s the kind of thing that should be well known, that should be out there.
Scrutiny is not a bad thing.
Indeed, it’s a necessary thing if you want good governance.
I look forward to the same people who wrote, edited and authorised that piece lending their support to a campaign to have referees declare which teams they support.
If you doubt that’ll happen … well I do too.
What is galling about this, of course, is the shocking, shameful, double standard.
It’s about what we’ve come to expect from this dishonourable rag and those who make up its absolutely hopeless sports department.
They are quite simply the best of the worst.
And just when you think they couldn’t disgrace themselves further …
You can read “No Resolution – Why Campbell Ogilvie Can’t Just Waltz Into The Sunset” Here