Rodgers was angrier at full time today than I’ve heard him in a long time, and it’s overdue. Had we questioned some of the appalling decisions from officials when we were winning games – as some of us have long urged – we might not be here today where some of the more desperate hacks are going to say that this is sour grapes following a defeat.
But there is no smokescreen here. That’s as clear an example of a single official making ridiculous decisions that directly influenced the result of a match that you will ever see. John Beaton decided that game, and if he’d got those decisions right there would be nothing to talk about. But neither of them was even close. They are outrageous.
Rodgers got some stick from The Village Idiot for personally naming John Beaton in his attack. Well, first, I’ll accept that criticism when someone plays back what he said about the Ibrox club deliberately targeting Collum. Not one whisper to that effect escaped his mouth.
Secondly, if we don’t start naming and shaming people how are we going to get better? Nobody at Celtic is saying Beaton shouldn’t referee our games after all, and not even in tactical briefings to bloggers. I don’t think any Celtic fans wants to see him do so, but the club has not got an official policy on this one way or the other and the manager wasn’t trying to set one.
He is focussed on one game, today’s game, saying that Beaton should be personally accountable for that travesty and that’s a wholly legitimate view to take. It is exactly the view that the club should be taking as well, and they should make a statement to that end.
Celtic will never demand that an individual ref be banned from doing our games. But we can insist on higher standards and we can state our view, and it will be shared by other clubs, that officials should be accountable and sanctioned when they fall below those standards, otherwise how do you expect ever to improve them?
Beaton’s decisions today come at a critical juncture in this title race.
If the league is decided by a point, who will argue that this game didn’t play a critical role? Those decisions were so completely wrong as to render them virtually indefensible. If you think that they are just a result of incompetence and not bias you are fully entitled to that view, but in holding that view you have to accept that he shouldn’t be in charge of any further top flight game, because you simply can’t trust him to get the big calls right.
This is a perverse situation for our club to have permitted in the first place. Nothing happened today which wasn’t totally expected. We even had former ref Steve Conroy in the media this very week suggesting that officials might decide the destination of this title, and the longer we in this game continue with the VAR farce the worse it gets.
That’s something else our club should be committing itself to; ridding our league of this “technology” once and for all, on the understanding that all it has accomplished is that it gives our enemies more chances than ever to do us harm. Nobody in the game would have agreed to its introduction knowing that it would actually make matters worse, and if we were the first club to call it out and say we’re not willing to pay for its retention we wouldn’t be alone.
Something has to give. How much more damage to this campaign are we going to let those at Hampden do? On a weekend when the Ibrox club has demonstrated to other clubs that it’s beatable (just not to Hearts, who did exactly what they were supposed to today in total contrast to their utter surrender last weekend) we are damned lucky that it hasn’t completely upended our campaign and put this title race almost out of reach.
We can consider this a warning shot, not a coup de grâce. We had bloody better heed it and start working, right now, to prevent Hampden’s officials from harming us any further.
Is it bias on Beaton’s part or match fixing?
Given the amount of money that’s at stake this season, I think there is something worthy of investigation.
Totally agree something must be done looks the league and cup the bent officials will decide who wins also various should not be used if 4 ref’s can’t get it right we’re in trouble
Good luck with that Tony B. The authority in this country is a closed shop. We’ve let this kind of shite go on too long so any reaction now would be interpreted as a kneejerk and sour grapes.
You also forget that the penalty were awarded was soft to put it mildly.
Celtic should have been at the forefront for match officiating reform long, long ago. Beaton should be nowhere near a Celtic match. If Celtic and the chimps played in the EPL, it would not be allowed. Nor would he be allowed to officiate in a match involving his beloved sevco.
There is scope for change and I think most teams would welcome it. Even that other lot. As Celtic fans we need to stop with the conspiracy stuff and stick to calling out incompetence. Regardless of whether Beaton was doing his team a turn today or not (I suspect he was) that’s not a viable route to go down when taking him, and those like him, to task. We can call them out for incompetence though. If we want to be taken seriously, that’s the hill where we must make our stand.
Or, is it bias on the SFA’s part or match fixing?
The SFA has proven – numerous times over the years – that it is
an insular, amateurish organisation.
And the unqualified, Ian Maxwell was – allegedly – simply handed the CEO job.
No exhaustive, far reaching recruitment search was deemed necessary?
An ex-player and boss of Partick Thistle was judged the
‘best person for the job’ ?!
The SFA is a pathetic group of incompetents – with the inherent support of
all 42 senior clubs – including CFC.
Rather than protect and develop the national game,
the SFA will ultimately, kill the Scottish game as we know it.
Guaranteed.
Investigate the refs and the Scottish league . It hurts them that the Hoops are a non cheating club but they need refs who assist them . Celtic will this league without cheating ,HAIL HAIL Cceltic love you. .
Cheating club is Sevco .
We know Beaton is a cheat. The goldson handball that was deliberate last season which he never gave.This man should be investigated and should be suspended.I wonder how many of his friend’s have made money from today’s game.
Never mind all this nonsense about beaton we all know what he is” just playing better and win it’s that easy.
Our club leader is a CEO stooge.
We would be stupid to think that he would
– belatedly – find his voice.
We are a global club,
‘mismanaged’ by insular, parochial,
corporate pygmies – who should be
nowhere near our club.
VAR is not the problem, it is the way it is operated that is the problem.
Referee should be the only person to call for another look at a situation where he is unsure and a big call is to be made. Minor errors will be made by Refs during games and he has to stand by those errors without VAR but when it is a big call he cannot afford to get it wrong having asked for another look. This takes away any need for another official to be in charge of a video rerun, a lay person could do the replay. To have two Refs with their own subjective view and where the one not on the field suggests that the on field Ref have another look makes the whole thing amateurish.
Fans are paying to be cheated and the cheaters are paid for doing the cheating and getting away wth it. Match fixing is a better term for it.
Sack VAR and the Scottish f.cking SFA and bring in non bigoted Officials from other leagues .
When I saw that Brother Beaton was on VAR duty I knew that the big decisions would go against us. I agree that this was not incompetence it was definitely cheating. We have virtually no chance of winning the league. The masons will see to that. The club, as usual, will remain silent.
James now that Brendan has called out todays officials especially Beaton it is now our so called board duty on behalf of us the fans to back him up and send in a letter of complaint they are fast enough to take our money, sevco put in a complaint about collum at least they back their fans, we will just wait and see.
As I said in another blog earlier, this is the unseen hand, and, I wish to fuck we never got that penalty as it would have been a whole lot different passage of play, and let me say, that was 1 shit penalty, if, it’s down the middle, it can not, and never should be along the ground. Fuck sake, I still thought that that we would have beat that shower of shit with 10 men
Let’s ask for the audio for starters!
James, I couldn’t articulate it better, myself.
As I said in earlier comments, Beaton’s VAR interventions were biased ridden rather than adhering to accurate refereeing rules. The fact that the ref, saw both incidents and decided to upgrade to a red card and award a penalty, makes him appear equally culpable, incompetent and biased.
Our fans can, and are entitled to give their opinion on our team’s performance today, but I don’t agree we were absolutely rotten. I’m gutted about how wasteful we were again, from the penalty spot and it becomes a different narrative if we score ! However, we didn’t …that doesn’t detract from the two decisions that ultimately cost us the game !
As you say, the time to complain about Beaton and his cabal was when we were winning and cruising at the top. To have ignored it then, whilst Ibrokes gave out their weekly critical communique about certain refs, is negligence, bordering on delinquency, from our club.
Our club has to make a statement about VAR and announce there will be no further funding from us, until these Sevco fans with whistles and VAR controls, are completely and routinely removed/ and replaced by competent and transparent officials.( if any can be found !)
Until that happens, we will be continually shafted! If the Sound of Silence over VAR & officials, from our club, results in losing this title, then heads most certainly, should roll!
1) our board will do nothing. As far as I’m concerned they are part of the problem.
2) so we should get rid of var! Oh right and go back to the honest mistake brigade. No at least with var we can question these cheats without it all we will hear is how hard it is for refs. But yes above all our club has to wake the hell up.
Crawford fkin Allan better get the fkin audio released
Celtic should demand not ask for a replay considering what’s at. Stake and if they don’t get it take it all the way to the courts this blatant cheating has been going on far to long to suit one club
free drinkies for that ranger supporting little Prk in his favourite wanger S.hitholes…imagine the ref in the Manchester derby was a loyal blue..!!!
Beggars belief that it carries on in Scotland.
Beaton destroyed that game and he’ll carry on his cheaty beaty ways in the future—blatant cheating!!!!
James its the ref who has the final decision, we thought we where going top ,today’s a setback but not a season defining moment
Until now nothing had even being said on this subject, my view all season has been if the rangers are not permitted to win the league this season they will go under . We can see it in every game they are involved in , var had been corrupted by the Sevco Friends Association (SFA) , until Brendan takes the team off the pitch and says u can have the 3 points , u we’re getting them anyway we had enough, nothing will be done by our gutters board .
It has gone way past the time when our Club should be releasing a statement on not only today’s incidents regarding the officiating but all games where we see such incompetence
This Celtic board really need to get a Spine and start calling this Cheating out and yes I believe it is Cheating and not just incompetence.