One of the most unwelcome sights of the week was Neil Doncaster sticking his head above the parapet the other day, fresh from his latest crisis, the SFA giving a club permission to sue the SPFL in court, to defend VAR although he predicts more “issues” with it.
Ange Postecoglou had the number of these people, when he pointed out that there shouldn’t be issues if the people on the other side of the technology are doing their damned jobs right. It’s disconcerting to hear anyone in his position putting forth a view which essentially says “we can’t get our act together so I’m preparing you for the chaos to come.”
If his refs were up to the job, there would be no further “issues.” How long do these people need to sort themselves out for God’s sake? VAR has already gone from being something with great promise to essentially being a joke amongst fans; how much worse is this supposed to get before clubs tell the governing bodies that they can stick it in the bin?
Celtic should be worried about those comments, and not just because those “issues” have affected us more than other clubs. The warning to expect more of these “issues” proves, as if we needed further proof, that SFA run refereeing is like a bad joke that has gone on too long. It’s Doncaster getting the excuses in early, and it shows that nothing has changed and that nothing is likely to change as long as pygmies like are running football here.
It does feel, at times, as if we’re stuck in a revolving door with these people. We used to complain about how long Lawwell has been at Celtic – we still do in fact. Doncaster should have been booted out of Scottish football in 2012, and eleven years on he is still here and has somehow conspired to rise even further. That could not have happened in a football environment where the meritocracy was in effect. It makes you shudder to imagine who might be next.
But it’s clear that this guy is out of ideas, or is so dead-set on protecting the status quo that it amounts to the same thing. Imagine making excuses for the coming season this early in the cycle? It is pathetic, and it sums up the dysfunction our club tolerates for reasons known only to the people who sit at the top of our own institution.
It cannot continue like this. I know that intellectually.
But I’ve known it for every single one of those eleven years … and here we still are. It’s a dire state of affairs.