GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - OCTOBER 12: SFA President Mike Mulraney and SFA Chief Executive Office Ian Maxwell during a 2026 FIFA World Cup Qualifying match between Scotland and Belarus at Hampden Park, on October 12, 2025, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Craig Williamson/SNS Group via Getty Images)
There are people in the Scottish sporting media whose perspective on Sunday’s events has been completely warped. A handful have gone further than the rest. Now, they are openly calling for official sanctions against Celtic and the other Glasgow club.
One suggestion raised last night was the hilariously overblown idea of points deductions.
The idea is absurd.
I would love to see the SFA grow a set of balls and attempt it.
I would love to see them try to pressure the SPFL into issuing such a sanction. Because I would love to see Celtic’s response to it. The Ibrox club’s reaction would no doubt be equally loud and volcanic, although frankly I care far less about that.
There are those who say Celtic would not respond forcefully because we never do.
They argue that the club is fundamentally gutless.
Yet there is a difference between being cautious and simply allowing someone to punch the living daylights out of you. A club can sabotage itself in many ways. However, even our board would surely draw the line at governing bodies attempting to flip the title race in the direction of Hearts.
If sanctions are coming, someone will have to explain them in detail.
They will have to explain the reasons they were issued. Also, they must explain why similar sanctions have not been imposed previously for comparable incidents. Almost everything the media has been raising hell about over the past few days is relatively commonplace at derby matches across football.
If broken seats become a sanctionable offence, then every club that has suffered broken seats should be asking why visiting supporters did not bring sanctions down on their own teams before now.
This is not a unique occurrence. If it suddenly attracts a unique punishment, we are entitled to ask why.
Pitch incursions to celebrate with players are technically against the rules. However, they happen regularly and have rarely led to meaningful sanctions.
If this particular incident suddenly becomes sanctionable, the obvious question is what makes it different from every other occasion when supporters have entered the pitch after a major victory?
Ibrox supporters spilled onto the pitch at Celtic Park several years ago. It did not spark a riot and it did not lead to sanctions. Why not?
What exactly is the dreadful confluence of events that has seen this branded a “shame game”?
The answer is simple. Ibrox supporters attacked Celtic supporters.
That is the unique element here.
I have said it repeatedly and will continue saying it as long as the media tries to obscure the fact.
Supporters invading the pitch with the intention of violence, attacking officials and players, is a uniquely dangerous moment. It should carry consequences.
However, only one club’s supporters were responsible for that behaviour.
Another proposed sanction now circulating in the media is equally amusing.
The suggestion now being floated is that away supporters should be banned from attending this fixture altogether.
Fine.
Bring it on.
Follow that argument to its logical conclusion and the whole thing collapses under its own weight.
If people claim that away supporters present a genuine public safety risk at these matches, then the policy must apply immediately. Not next season. Not when it suits someone. Now.
Apply it now and the consequences become obvious. Ibrox supporters would not enter Celtic Park for the final league meeting between the clubs this season.
Suddenly the people demanding this change smash head first into a brick wall.
Because the next complaint would arrive instantly. They would claim Celtic had gained an unfair advantage, an advantage the Ibrox club did not face ten days ago when around 2,000 Celtic supporters entered their ground.
At that point the argument becomes completely ridiculous.
If the counter proposal says the ban should start next season, then the entire case collapses. They tell us this fixture is uniquely dangerous. They tell us away supporters represent unacceptable risks. Yet their supposed solution allows those risks to continue for the rest of the season simply because applying the rule immediately might inconvenience one club.
Public safety suddenly becomes negotiable.
The reputation of Scottish football suddenly becomes negotiable.
Everything loudly proclaimed as essential over the past few days would quietly be pushed aside until a more convenient moment.
The reason is obvious.
No one wants to disadvantage the Ibrox club.
That calculation drives this entire debate.
Bluntly put, if this fixture is genuinely too dangerous for away supporters then the ban must begin immediately. Ibrox supporters should not enter Celtic Park for the next game.
Full stop.
If that grants Celtic a momentary advantage, then frankly it amounts to a small measure of justice after the nonsense we have listened to for the past two days.
Of course it will never happen.
It will never happen because the moment the consequences become clear, the appetite for “reform” will vanish overnight.
That will expose exactly what this entire discussion has been since Ibrox thugs stormed the pitch with weapons in their hands.
Posturing.
Distraction.
A smokescreen designed to move the spotlight away from the real problem.
The coming weeks will reveal who is serious about reforming Scottish football and who is not. We will see who genuinely wants violent behaviour removed from the game and who simply performs outrage when the cameras are on.
And my suspicion is that once the implications become uncomfortable for the Ibrox club, the noise will stop.
Just like it always does.
When that reality dawns, the noise will fade and many will quietly hope the entire issue disappears.
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How can you be sanctioned in the League for something that has happened in a cup tie?
“That will expose exactly what this entire discussion has been since Ibrox thugs stormed the pitch with weapons in their hands. Posturing. Distraction.”
Aye! They got knocked out of the Scottish Cup by a seriously weakened Celtic team. Just how embarrassing must that be? Especially given they were at full strength and had home advantage. They can’t face up to the fact that they are nowhere near as good as they thought.
Exactly what I’m saying James.. Nicholson and the board show get tooled up and take on the SFA and defend the Celtic fans after the disgraceful carry on in Liebox, every film recordering shows our fans where contained and it was the lowlife want to be hard men onion brats dressed as Smurfs who crossed the halfway line with the intention of killing as many fenians as possible. Horrible rat Nicholson should grow a pair of balls and defend our fans
The idea of no away fans on the back Sundays events is preposterous and must not be allowed to gain any traction. Question one in response to this ‘proposal’ is “exactly WTF is your plan for Cup Finals? Toss a coin to decide which set of fans gets to attend?” Good luck with that.
Two elements came together to cause Sundays events, as James has already covered in detail, the first is an emboldened element among the most rabid sections of the Ibrox support, which thought it could behave like that and get away with it. The majority of their fans turned on their heels and headed for the subway, and fair play to them. The second part was an ill-judged and weak security operation which made the situation worse than it ought to have been by being reactive instead of proactive. Even when I was watching the the end of extra time and the start of the penalties I noticed the absence of the ‘march of the yellow jackets’ around the pitch which normally occurs five minutes before the end of matches to discourage pitch incursions. It happens even when we’re at home to Livingston and we’re 5-0 up so why it didn’t happen on Sunday is a question the match commander will have to answer. Its absence may explain her frankly embarrassing comments about the continuation of away allocations for these matches as ‘unsustainable’. This is tantamount to the police running up a white flag and acceding to mob rule.
The solution to increased public disorder is nothing new. It is robust enforcement and harsh sentencing. It’s what ended the ‘razor gangs’ in the 1930s, and more recently serious disorder at Luton v Watford matches was wiped out overnight by everyone arrested after serious disturbances getting nine month custodial sentences – not suspended sentences, either. The solution is there and there is clear precedent for it, it doesn’t require summits, new legislation or a task force. Just a few agreements up front and the will to see it through.
We know they will hit both clubs with the same sanction. One for enjoyment and the other for violent intent.
Why Celtic supporters support Scotland and the SFA I’ll never know.
The cops through their incompetent planning in my mind were to blame for the the problems in and around that ground. They are already covering their arses and throwing out red herrings. The huns of course took full advantage of this incompetence to attack us inside and outside, after the cops themselves had set our fans up without a thought for our safety. The SFA and the lying cops will come to some arrangement to involve us and sanction us with no investigation into there own parts in it, or the huns who scrimped on safety inside the stadium when they as the home team had a duty of care for everyone in that stadium.
All the authorities that run Scottish football,all the police Scotland head honchos & all the boards at ipox have never once denounced the actions of sevco fans at ipox over the years for there fans disgusting behaviour,from celtic backroom staff & fans being left with blood streaming down there faces to the broken glass in Joe harts goalmouth,sevco beat Celtic at parkhead only a few weeks ago & no Celtic fans invaded the pitch to assault sevco fans,don’t ban away fans from ipox it’s got to be the home fans as that’s where the problem lies
It’ll probably come to away fans banned…
But probably not for the post split Glasgow Derby…
In any case I wouldn’t give the Scummy Bastards the chance to say we had an advantage over them…
At least we won in (probably) the biggest away support that’ll ever be at Liebrox ever again !