The pencils were all sharpened and ready to write about how we’d blown a five point lead and that Ibrox was now neck and neck with us.
You know that this was the narrative being prepared. Hacks who fully expected their favourites to win at the weekend were poised, at 2-1 to Hearts and then at 3-3, to write that we were rattled and looking vulnerable.
With that off the table due to our winner, and then the Ibrox club not getting their own job done, they had two options; to write the latest Bad News Chronicles and put pressure on the Sevco regime or to find a way to turn on Celtic.
I think Keith Jackson showed real imagination this morning in making the bulk of his column a deranged rant against the presenters of CelticTV. But it also showed him up, again, as a dreadful journalist, a terrible writer and a snarking hypocrite.
In lashing out against “irresponsible VAR rabble rousing” he has, as on prior occasions, abrogated his responsibilities as a journalist. That decision at the weekend was indefensible.
Instead of doing his job and asking hard questions about how a Grade One official can make such a blatantly wrong call, even with VAR to support him, Jackson wants to rant about how our former players reacted to the referee’s decision. What a joke that is.
Let me remind him of something he would rather ignore.
Turn on the radio or the TV these days, or open a national newspaper, and you cannot fail to notice the stench of Ibrox. There are so many ex-players and ex-managers of that club working in the Scottish press corps they could form their own retirement community.
Kenny Miller – was on Clyde tonight arguing against the penalty that even Bobby Madden thinks was a stonewaller – is just the latest of them, and although I’ve hardly heard a sensible word out of his mouth, he seems to be in more places than COVID.
These people do nothing but push the party line from Ibrox, no matter how absurd, no matter how ridiculous, no matter how disconnected from reality, 24/7 at the moment and they have no problem with accusing people of bias when it suits them.
Jackson is one of the leading cheerleaders for the idea that a Great Unseen Fenian Hand is at work behind the scenes at the SFA and the SPFL. For him to accuse people of stoking paranoia and fuelling fires is hypocritical at best.
No-one in Scottish journalism has been such a willing, sycophantic participant in Ibrox’s own demented campaigns against Doncaster, Maxwell and McLennan.
On top of that is his attempt – his pathetic attempt – to pretend that Ange waived aside all talk of controversy.
What he actually did was so far removed from that you wonder how far up his own backside Jackson’s head is on this particular occasion. Ange made it perfectly plain his views on the penalty. His comment about only taking them in training was a pointed reference to the reluctance of officials to award them to us.
Or did Jackson miss that? I think not. Nor is he too stupid to understand it, although that one is less cut and dried because we’re not dealing with a Quiz Kid here.
“It was difficult not to have some sympathy with the man in the middle of this magnificent mayhem at Tynecastle,” he writes.
Actually, it is difficult verging on impossible to have any sympathy for him whatsoever.
This is the Referees Protection Society at its finest, refusing to ask hard questions, refusing to acknowledge even the possibility that this decision was something other than bad judgement.
You know, I have long been of the view that when the crooks do sink their teeth into our sport – provided they aren’t at work already – it will be in no small part because idiots like Jackson refuse to even entertain the idea that something rotten might be at work.
If I wanted to fix matches, I could not think of a better environment in which to get busy and that’s because we have a media here which is either gutless or already in on the con.
Either way, this is precisely the attitude which virtually guarantees that those who have something to hide will never have anything to fear. That’s why his comments are as indefensible as the penalty decision itself, the one he pointedly refuses to scrutinise.
The more Kenny Miller backs decisions that go against Celtic the more airtime he’s getting
He is f*king everywhere
Can’t think of any other reason for his ubiquity. He’s got a face like a well skelped arse, a monotonous voice and a serious lack of football knowledge or insight.
That Crichton woman is ten times the pundit he is.
Jackshun’s days are numbered so he is desperately trying to appease his reader base i.e. huns.
He lost any credibilty he might have had years ago and now he is one of the growing numbers of Ibrox fanboys polluting our meedja.
He and his kind will destroy Scottish football if they are allowed, all for the sake of promoting and preserving one batshit criminal enterprise.
So we must not let them.
Save Scottish football.
Expose the cheats.
In any type of work if you are a professional, you are expected to do a professional job in the case of our referees this can’t be said in Scotland utter useless, but we should always remember everyone is against us the hacks, the pundits, the spfl, the sfa, to name but a few so we must always stick to our own bubble.
I detest the cheating that blatantly is going on . It was not only the obvious penalty ,good goal chalked off ,at least a blatant offside given by brother linesman roome 2-3 yards on-site to give the Edinburgh huns one last chance to throw the ball into Celtics box and hope for a break of the ball or even better another honest mistake.
I used to referee my kids teams games if the referee didn’t turn up my team were not to keen on me refereeing as they said every 50-50 I would give against my own team my reason was I didn’t want to look biased towards the team I was connected to.
IF ONLY !WALSH !MCLEAN !BEATON !MADDEN!AITKEN!MUNRO!DAVIS! MUNRO!ANDERSON! ALLAN !ROOME! To name but a few sorry Willie colum you are just useless.
Remember R H Davidson from Airdrie, During Jock Steins time, this bigoted referee took charge of 8 old firm games. 5 Rangers wins and three draws. That tells you that even then, the bigots were out in force.
Every “the rangers” supporters I’ve spoke to or seen online said it was a stonewall penalty. Except 2 Walsh, and McClean
Let’s get the ‘paranoia’ idea out there again, that’s the real message here from this clown. Was a reliable safety net for people of his mindset tae fall into for decades, when it came tae obvious, pro ibrox, bent officials. Was actually wonderin recently, when they were gonnae start pullin this ‘paranoid’ card out their arse again and that slabberin halfwits managed it right away. VAR’s no totally reliable and there’s still room there for certain officials tae exploit for their own corrupt motives. Jackson knows this and that’s how he feels the need tae write a completely anti-Celtic, hypocritical, arrogant and patronising article. The guys a fuckin fraud. A joke.
Great article, very well put, and a lot of my grievances mentioned, hopefully a lot more
more honest football fans stand up and say something.
What I find interesting is, when *rangers indicated that Clancy and Collum, were incompetent, not one pundit or former player, appeared in the media to back the referees.
No one from Celtic has indicated that Walsh and McLean are poor referees, yet we have allsorts rushing to defend them.
Same as it ever was.
I wonder if Keith’s piece would have been the same if that call was given against sevco in their game at Ibrokes v livi .
Does anyone think for a second that walsh and mclean would have made that call .
As was said previous the one that needs answered was when the linesman flagged abada offside when there was at least 3 hearts players behind him ,thus giving hearts one last chance to get the ball into the box at the death .
I’ve only seen TV of the Abada one and unfortunately from what I’ve seen I have no idea where Abada or the defenders were when ball kicked so I really can’t comment. The bizarre whistle blown before scored goal should’ve stood but the argument against VAR being able to intervene is sound. I will give Walsh the benefit of the doubt here that he’s not used to letting play continue in these circumstances as VAR is new- in other words this is the sort of “teething problem” we probably would expect and it is unfortunate (but maybe predictable) that we were the team affected.
What I absolutely cannot see any justification for is the VAR team telling the ref on the pitch he needn’t review the Smith handball. What MacLean has done there is remove the option for Walsh to review the incident and make his own decision. I think it’s pretty clear from the footage that Walsh was swithering on it and was looking for VAR guidance before making a decision- which is actually fine and should be how we use it. But how anyone could see that footage and not offer the ref on the pitch the option to review it, I will never know. He should’ve been given a look and the chance to make his own decision there.
Thing that angers me, who the fuck does jackson think he is. A total goon thats more than happy tae tell every Celtic minded person, player, official, you name it, that we’re all paranoid. Nothin but a hypocritical, pish talkin ibrox cheerleader, that sees himself as some sort of sentinel for his favourite club. Tae think this halfwit knows, and he knows alright, there’s past and present bias wi these officials and has the arrogance tae use the paranoia accusation against us, shows exactly how much his heads up his own arse. Fuckin non entity that he is.
Check out the sportscene ‘analysis’ of the game – it’s ridiculous
What I do not understand is why fans and supporters of all the club’s bar one particapate Inthis charade sure we all love our club’s but why give money on fake sport give it to WWE that is more genuine than fake/false corrupt Scottish football every fan every supporters need to start withholding monies and remove all these corrupt cheating individuals that are destroying it all integrity is already lost I.E.2012 and all the lies then Which still impacting onevery aspect of Scottish football.save our football rant over HAIL!HAIL!
Agree with all of that Martin. I think we all know why the ref wasn’t given the option to review the decision.
Slow it down and you’ll see clearly that as Forest touches the ball, Smith’s hand was by his side as the VAR operative stated. By the time it hits his hand though, the hand is out. Clear as day pen.
The VAR operative, rangers supporting, brother of an ex-rangers player, decided it didn’t need reviewing and with no consequences. Easy for all those hun pundits to say it wasn’t given so it’s not a foul when the doors are shut on the VAR room to allow a subjective decision to be made by that person only, excluding the ref. Let’s see how a similar decision with another team across the city is judged and what those pundits say then. Lying hypocrites
Yup. If I’m Nick Walsh I’m livid that I’ve been left with the flak for that by my VAR team.
Not sure of the protocol in Scotland but elsewhere I KNOW that would be offered to the on field ref to have final say. The fact it wasn’t, when he clearly had a discussion about it, is the bit that really doesn’t sit right with me. Our VAR teams would say no need to review in a situation like that if there was a handball claim and the ball, on footage, clearly hits the face, or the leg and goes nowhere near the hand (to avoid holding play up unreasonably). But when it actually hits the hand, you let the ref see the video.
Always remember that Steven McLean is the man who won the Scottish Cup for Calley Thistle. His “unseen” hand ball in the Semi Final literally changed the history of Scottish football for ever. If the justified penalty had been awarded against Calley in that game, they would have been out (absolutely not ifs or buts). How McLean is still around senior refereeing today after that “blunder” is astonishing. The latest one at Tynecastle on Saturday surely has to put the authorities under pressure to do something about him.
I notice that when Jackson has a go at Ange’s judgment it’s always through his column, never a verbal challenge on a face to face. They like to refer to us as keyboard warriors. How are we different from the Scottish Sports Media. Think Ange frightens them, jist a teeny, weeny bit.
Fantastic article and I’ll never grow tired of reading the God’s Honest Truth ? BRILLIANT
The Dallas cowboys- Hugh’s legacy.
McClean, Robertson, Beaton, Walsh, Clancy, Dallas Junior or Mini Me, Madden, Thomson, etc. etc. a never ending line of
Competent,
Unbiased,
Non-partisan,
Truthful,
Stewards of our national sport.
I think it was Mini Me who gave The Rangers a season’s worth of penalties in one afternoon and give him his due he got one of the decisions right.
Isn’t it great when you beat these cheats.
It looks like VAR is going to become the gift that keeps on giving for the bigots , cant beat us on the pitch they now have VAR to help , Celtic can not remain silent on this or every time there is a 50/50 tackle in the Celtic box a check and penalty will result and the title will be going for a walk across the city .