Of Course Madden Trolled Celtic Fans On Social Media. We Let Refs Be Unaccountable.

Aside from Chris Sutton, furiously berating Bobby Madden yesterday, few in the media care that he was absolutely appalling and disgracefully one-sided. Nobody cares because this time there were no major moments which changed the game, no “big decision” that he got wrong and because we weren’t the team who won the match.

The media will give Madden a free ride, although our hacks know full well that he isn’t fit to be refereeing top football matches. Likewise, the SFA will stand by their man, and in the absence of a formal complaint from Celtic why shouldn’t they?

Yesterday, at full time, Ange went out of his way not to stir the pot.

We all love the guy and how he always tries to give officials the benefit of the doubt, but you wonder what it will take until he snaps, because he has to know what he watched yesterday.

It’s to his credit that he tries to rise above it, but it’s clear that he’s yet to fully grasp what it is that we’re up against here. These people can cost him his job over time; he needs to recognise that he’s not operating in a benign environment here.

Does he think the media are the only people he can’t trust?

In the aftermath yesterday, when you’d think Madden would want to keep his head down, he went on social media instead, posting a picture of himself smiling as he came out of the tunnel and wishing people a Happy Easter.

Sutton was so furious he retweeted it. Celtic fans, are of course, outraged. It’s obvious trolling … but let’s face it, it’s not the worst thing that we’ve seen from officials in the country. In fact, it’s pretty far from it.

There are officials who train in their Ibrox club gear. We know this for a fact as former officials have talked about. There is no secret about which way some of them lean. We have Andrew Dallas as a Grade One Official, continuing the family name and all that goes with it … think that deep down he’s a friend to this club? Christ sakes, we have John Beaton celebrating in an Ibrox fan bar hours after he’d played a major role in assuring a victory for them.

How many former refs are on the lodge speaking circuit?

How many have openly boasted about their allegiances?

It doesn’t all go unremarked upon – how else would we know this stuff if it wasn’t in the press and widely disseminated? But it goes unchanged. It isn’t confronted.

Refs exist in their own wee private member’s club and nobody holds them to account.

Nobody appears terribly interested in doing so either, or it would be done.

In any industry there would be at least one reform document sitting in a drawer somewhere, some critical thinking piece on how to modernise refereeing. It must exist, because somebody must have taken a stab at this over at Hampden, at some point.

So why hasn’t it been enacted?

There isn’t a single person in the Scottish football power structure, or in the mainstream media, who doesn’t think there are serious problems with our officials. Even those who don’t believe that they are biased know full well that what we’re watching is either refs trying to influence games or it’s the worst kind of incompetence … even if you only believe in the latter scenario, why would you continue to watch it without demanding change?

Our own club has adopted a policy of … we don’t know what.

Officially, at least, they are content with wee chats behind the scenes.

What good will that do? What enhancements will it bring?

VAR would not have forced Madden to change how he officiated yesterday; are we really content to pay for technology that will not get to the heart of the matter?

It doesn’t matter if you think that he was pro-Ibrox yesterday or just had an absolute shocker.

He knew that there was disbelief in many quarters about his performance. He knew that he had infuriated our entire support.

So whether you think he was thumbing his nose at criticism or engaging in open contempt for us, Bobby Madden was laughing at us yesterday on Instagram.

That’s the truth of it. He brazenly mocked us.

Because he can. Because they all can.

Because we’ve talked a good game in public but done nothing.

Because although everyone knows that our officials are sub-par if they aren’t nakedly biased nobody seems to want to confront that far less do something about it.