The SFA escalates the Stewart thing because it doesn’t want you talking about real stuff.

The SFA’s sheer brass neck almost impresses me at times. Scottish football’s governing body presides over a refereeing system that has lost the confidence of supporters, managers, clubs and now, apparently, the wider football world. Yet it still manages to convince itself that the real crisis is Michael Stewart opening his mouth.

That takes talent. Not useful talent, obviously. Not the kind you would want anywhere near a functioning organisation. But talent all the same.

Because this is where we are now.

As I wrote this morning, the SFA has banned Michael Stewart from Hampden. The referees’ union released a statement today that basically says, “he got what he deserved.”

Yesterday, in a farcical escalation, officials reportedly barred him from the stadium car park as well, even though he contributed to coverage from a production truck outside the ground. Premier Sports called the move “deeply disappointing” and accused the SFA of interfering with its broadcast coverage. The referees’ association then backed the SFA and claimed Stewart’s criticism had become “agenda driven and personal.”

There is a lot to unpack there, but let’s start with the obvious point.

A serious governing body does not behave like this.

This is not proportionate. It is not clever. An institution comfortable in its own skin does not act like this. It looks petty, thin-skinned and defensive. Worse than that, it looks like an attempt to turn Michael Stewart into the story at the exact moment when the real story should be Scottish refereeing itself.

Yes, this is a deflection tactic. It has to be.

Because while the SFA and the referees’ association are busy clutching their pearls over the tone of punditry, there is a rather larger embarrassment sitting in plain sight.

Not one Scottish official has been selected for the 2026 World Cup. Not a referee. Nor a single assistant referee. Not one video match official.

FIFA has named 170 match officials for the tournament: 52 referees, 88 assistant referees and 30 video match officials. Scotland is absent from the list.

This is not a Celtic blog saying Scottish referees are not good enough. It is not a phone-in caller having a rant after a bad VAR decision. It is not a pundit with an “agenda.” This is FIFA looking across the world game and deciding that, for the biggest tournament in football, there is no place for a single Scottish official.

That should be a moment of deep reflection inside Hampden. Instead, the SFA appears to have found something else to talk about. Michael Stewart.

Funny that.

The timing could hardly be more convenient. Rather than explain why Scottish refereeing has been shut out of the World Cup, rather than address what that says about the standard of officiating in this country, rather than ask why the domestic game is so riddled with distrust, confusion and anger, the SFA has turned its fire on a broadcaster.

Earlier this season, the Scottish FA congratulated itself on placing 29 officials on the FIFA international list for 2026.

Willie Collum said that representing Scotland on the FIFA list was a great honour and “opens the door to officiating at the very highest level of the game.” Yet when that door to the very highest stage opened, nobody from Scotland walked through it.

That is the uncomfortable fact and it deserves scrutiny. That is what Scottish football should be discussing.

Instead, we are now expected to believe the real threat to the game comes from Michael Stewart saying harsh things about referees on television. Come on.

Nobody sensible argues that referees should face abuse. Nobody serious supports threats, harassment or personal targeting. There is a line, and when people cross it, others should call them out. Referees deserve basic respect as human beings. They deserve to go to work without fear. They deserve protection from genuinely abusive behaviour.

But criticism is not abuse. Scrutiny is not abuse. Questioning standards is not abuse.

Asking why a refereeing system appears to be failing is not abuse.

This is where the SFA always tries to blur the lines. The organisation takes legitimate anger over bad decisions, poor communication and rotten processes, then folds it into the same category as personal abuse.

It creates one big emotional fog and asks everyone to accept that criticism itself is part of the problem. It is not.

The problem is the standard. The problem is the lack of transparency. It is how this country has introduced and operated VAR.

The problem is the absurd secrecy around decision-making. It is the protectionist culture that kicks in whenever anyone questions officials. It is a governing body that behaves as though it can restore public confidence by telling people to shut up.

And now, with the World Cup list out, the issue has moved beyond domestic frustration. This is no longer just about supporters who feel cheated, confused or insulted. It is no longer just about managers speaking after games and trying to avoid a charge while still making it clear they are furious.

This is external validation of a domestic concern.

FIFA has not come out and said Scottish referees are not good enough. Of course it hasn’t. That is not how these bodies operate. But football reads a team sheet. It reads a squad list. It reads an appointments list. When officials select 170 referees for the biggest World Cup ever and not one comes from Scotland, the message does not need shouting.

It sits there in black and white.

The SFA should feel embarrassed by that. It should ask hard questions of itself. It should look at development, training, accountability, VAR standards, communication, consistency and the wider culture around officiating.

Instead, it has picked a fight with Michael Stewart.

There is something grimly familiar about that.

Scottish football has been here before. The refereeing establishment has long had a habit of presenting itself as the wounded party whenever scrutiny becomes uncomfortable. The most infamous example remains the “Dougie Dougie” affair in 2010, when Dougie McDonald admitted he had lied about the circumstances surrounding a reversed penalty decision in a Dundee United v Celtic game.

That scandal was not about one decision. It was about trust and accountability. It was about whether the system would protect itself rather than tell the truth.

What followed? A referees’ strike. During it, we found out what Hugh Dallas, the head of refereeing, had been up to.

The argument then was that officials were under unfair pressure and subject to abuse. Some of those concerns were legitimate. But the spark was a credibility crisis created by the officials themselves. A referee had lied. The head of referees was outed as a bigot. The system closed ranks. Celtic demanded answers. The referees withdrew their labour.

That pattern has never really gone away.

Whenever the pressure turns towards the system, the system tries to turn the conversation towards the tone of those criticising it. It happened after Dougie McDonald. It happened after years of VAR controversy. And it is happening again now.

This is not to say Michael Stewart is always right.

He is not. No pundit is. Stewart can be blunt, abrasive and occasionally too fond of his own certainty. But that is not the point. The point is whether his criticism is so dangerous, so outrageous, so uniquely harmful that it justifies the SFA banning him from Hampden and then apparently extending that ban to the car park.

That is where the whole thing becomes ridiculous.

Because if Stewart is wrong, answer him. If his analysis is flawed, challenge it. If his claims are unfair, correct them publicly and if his language crosses a line, explain where and why.

But banning him looks weak. It looks censorious. It looks like an institution trying to punish dissent rather than engage with criticism. And it gives Stewart a much bigger platform than he would otherwise have had. If the SFA wanted to turn this into a major story, congratulations. Mission accomplished.

The irony is that Stewart is now almost secondary to the whole thing. The SFA has made this about itself. Its reaction is more revealing than anything he said.

This is an organisation that seems far more comfortable disciplining voices than explaining failures.

That is the heart of it.

The Scottish game does not need another lecture about respect. It needs competence and accountability. It needs a refereeing structure people can believe in. Respect is not produced by statements. It is not produced by bans. It is not produced by treating criticism as contamination. Respect is earned by performance.

Right now, Scottish football has a refereeing system that supporters do not trust, clubs regularly question, managers tiptoe around and FIFA has ignored for the World Cup. That is the story. Not Michael Stewart.

The SFA can try to make him the story, but that does not change the reality. It only makes the deflection more obvious. Because when the biggest football tournament on the planet selects 170 officials and Scotland gets none, there it has questions to answer.

Why has Scottish refereeing fallen so far behind? How come VAR made the domestic game feel more chaotic rather than less? Why do clubs and supporters still have so little confidence in the process? How come the SFA respond to criticism with defensiveness instead of reform? Why is a pundit being treated as a bigger problem than the international humiliation of Scotland’s officials being absent from the World Cup?

Those are the questions.

Those are the questions the SFA does not seem to want to answer.

So, it talks about Michael Stewart instead.

Choose The CelticBlog as a ‘Preferred Source’ on Google News for quick access to the news you value.