Monday’s Derby saw a bug-ridden Celtic team clinch a point with a late Kyogo Furuhashi goal to maintain a nine-point margin over their city rivals.
Despite VAR and a global television audience, there was plenty for the Yorkshire Whistler to get into.
The impact of a call being incorrect can be evaluated using the framework outlined here -> Honest Mistakes in the SPFL.
02/01/23 The Rangers vs Celtic
Incident 1
| Referee | John Beaton |
| Game Minute | 52nd |
| Score At Time | 1-1 |
| Incident | Sakala goes down in the box under challenge from Starfelt |
| Outcome | Penalty to TRFC |
| Evidence | Rangers 2-2 Celtic | Late Furuhashi Goal Denies Rangers Old Firm Victory | cinch Premiership – YouTube
At 2:19 |
Incident 2
| Referee | John Beaton |
| Game Minute | 64th |
| Score At Time | 2-1 |
| Incident | Goldson blocks a Starfelt shot |
| Outcome | No decision |
| Evidence | Rangers 2-2 Celtic | Late Furuhashi Goal Denies Rangers Old Firm Victory | cinch Premiership – YouTube
At 3:33 |
| Yorkshire Whistler Verdict | Goldson blocks a Starfelt shot.
Initial on field decision: No foul committed.
From a Mooy corner, the ball is half cleared as far as Starfelt who then sees his shot charged down by Goldson. The ball appears to hit Goldson’s arm and so the question is then raised: Has a handball penalty offence been committed?
Goldson has very little time to react as the shot is fired at him from only a yard or two at most. He only raises his arms instinctively at the last second as he realises Starfelt’s shot is rising towards his face and the arm is more directly in front of where his face would have received the shot, as opposed to extended unnaturally wider. I am satisfied this incident, therefore, is the normal expected body shape specific to that particular situation and so no foul has been committed.
Verdict: Correct decision to not award the foul |
| Expected Points
Outcome |
No impact |
Summary
My thanks as always to the Yorkshire Whistler.
And remember, as much as his opinions may disappoint you, as I am sure will be the case for many this week, he is an independent and neutral professional expert.
If you look back over this series you will see his consistent interpretations of similar incidents.
This does not mean there are no trends to be discerned in the data when we consider the long term, of course.
Fortunately for Celtic, being consistently on the wrong end of handball decisions is not impeding their lead at the top of the table.
In terms of impact on the expected points picture, there is no change this week.
Based on the in-match game state when the decisions were made (or not made), The Rangers have 1.08 MORE points than expected due to the cumulative impact of Honest Mistakes and Celtic 4.12 LESS.
A swing of 5.2 xPts.
Celtic lead by nine points after 20 matches.
Can the Yorkshire whistler enlighten us to when a DEFENDER ceased being able to HEAD a ball away…or take one for the team …murdo took a mitre 5 to the coupon n came to on the plane home from world cup ffs …it was a pen …
Interesting that the whistler uses the phrase “raises his arms instinctively at the last second”.
That first of all makes the whistler a mind reader as he is assuming why the arms were raised and that the player wouldn’t possibly raise his hands to block a shot.
It isn’t the referees job to assume why a player has committed an offence. If that is the case they can justify a leg breaking tackle as “he didn’t mean to do it”.
Secondly that also must mean that there is a get out of jail free card for protecting your head and yet I’ve certainly never heard this ruse ever used before to justify why a penalty hasn’t been awarded.
Thus excuse is simply the “last refuge of a scoundrel” in an attempt to justify the unjustifiable.
Not 100% sure when but think it was Barry Ferguson in a Glasgow derby, he raised both hands to save the ball from hitting him on the face inside the box. No penalty. The smsm went into overdrive stating it was very acceptable to protect your face with your hands.
Time to find a new whistler, that’s almost every decision this so calls expert has justified to the benefit of all media channels in the Anglo Saxon country i unfortunately live in. In fact this site is going on the blocked list due to the mystifying content it continues to pish out!
It’s all very well to take each incident on its own merits, but these decisions happen within a context. That context suggests that if Bernabei and O’Reilly are penalised then Goldson should be penalised. It’s all about consistency. An old manager of mine used to say of bad referees that it was the same for both teams. In Scotland, it’s not the same for both teams.
Michael to be fair to the YW that isn;t his remit, that’s mine. May aim is to collect data over a period and have a sample size such that trends can be discerned. So i understand and accept your point re wider context but that isn;t what i am asking of the pro ref.
The YW has also ruled over both Bernabei and O’Reilly incidents, I do believe he is impartial. But the Goldson save in my mind is 100% penalty. I can’t see why it’s not.
Starfelt does all as the YW says EXCEPT catch Sakala’s right foot which stands on Starfelt’s right foot and gives way under the momentum.
Standing on an opponent’s ankle is a foul and a yellow dependent on intent. Plain as the Yorkshire rose on the whistlers face.
Was with him in nearly all his decisions to date but has been suckered with this one.
A career in the SPL awaits.
Always read these assessments & yes, often disagree but they do make me step out of my sea of bias.
Your own comment is more pertinent though.
We need obvious consistency & clear transparency, both things that the SFA have not & still don’t deliver.
The ‘omerta’ surrounding referees, their performances & decisions is a relic from a century ago. In an age with no live television, no recordings & just grainy monochrome stills to go on, suppressing legitimate complaints was easy.
To apply that same standard today only damages the integrity of the game in Scotland especially when compared to England.
I’ll now sheepishly share this article with a few opposition fans with whom I’ve had an exchange of opinion on the two incidents.
Not quite humble pie, more a side order of grovel I think.
Sorry but the defender needs to manually and take it on the chin,if that had happened in the middle of the park it would have been a free kick
Always the benchmark for me.
I agree that had a midfielder blocked a shot ( as opposed to protecting his face) in the centre circle, Beaton would have awarded a freekick to the opposition.
I now that refs watch for simulation/exaggeration etc in the box so adopt a different approach but it seems pretty clear that the easy decisions outside the box morph into something else when a penalty is a likely outcome.
Frankly, based on the shirt pulling etc that occurs when a corner is being taken, there should be half dozen penalties in every game.
Would that ref get a bollocking from the SFA?
Any one incident has subjectivity and can be argued one way or the other.
We need a league table of all teams in SPL over last 3-5 years.
How many goals for and against and how many penalties for and against.
It is common sense that there should be a correlation between total goals scored and total penalties received.
Also between goals conceeded and penalties conceeded.
I think its only this that will show any underlying, (unconscious – I hope) bias…
I would agree, it would be good to present hard facts, comparing these statistics to other leagues in Europe. Even comparing possession as another indicative marker against penalties. If this was corelated do you think any Scottish media would run the story? Or will they still continue to run the narrative that we are just paranoid Celtic fans and we should just sit down and be quiet.
It is frustrating that the Celtic board are happy to sit back and accept this.
You can flick through the penalties awarded here:
https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/scottish-premiership/topErhalteneElfmeter/wettbewerb/SC1/plus/?saison_id=2016
This season, there are three clubs with more than Rangers.
Last season, Rangers received as many as Celtic. There were two clubs with more than both.
The season Rangers won, they were joint top, only two ahead of Celtic (who were very poor).
In the called-early nine-in-a row season, Celtic were awarded five, Rangers three (second bottom in the league, they finished second, miles ahead of third).
In the first Rodgers season, Celtic were first by miles, Rangers were tenth – again, strange (by your logic) given that they finished third.
Throughout most of the MON and WGS seasons, Celtic were awarded more penalties than Rangers.
Is style of play not a more interesting thing to look at?
The bias angle strikes me as a dead end. Among other reasons, three of the top flight referees are Catholics, for what it’s worth. From indirect personal experience, I am all but sure that two of them are Celtic fans.
In recent seasons, Celtic plays a high defensive line. We also have CBs who are not particularly fast and a keeper who simply can’t cope with that amount of space.
On balance, the high line works for us, but it does mean that when opponents do get in behind, there’s chaos, which can lead to penalties conceded.
Rangers play a lower line and a medium block.
Rangers, at the other end, spend more time dribbling into opponents’ boxes and making fouls more likely. Celtic players rarely take more than two touches in the box.
All of this suits us. Our style of play is leading to more goals scored, fewer conceded and more points. A snag in the system is that is makes conceding penalties slightly more likely than if we positioned our defenders slightly deeper. Our system also makes penalty-winning scenarios less common.
But, who cares? We score more goals and concede fewer. There’s no need to have Jota taking deeper dribbles into and around the edge of the box (like Kent does, say). What he does now (largely dribbles outside the box and either shoots or passes as soon as he can inside the box) leads to more goals. We’re dire at taking penalties anyway.
Good points and well thought out but is some of that not subjective e.g. ………..Rangers, at the other end, spend more time dribbling into opponents’ boxes and making fouls more likely. Celtic players rarely take more than two touches in the box……….is this a fact or a hunch?
With regards to the penalties, again its hard to judge any trend unless its all presented at once (not individual seasons).
What is your conclusion Damian? There is no bias, just inadequate officials?
Thanks
I don’t have hard conclusions and I don’t think there are any to be drawn.
The game itself is notoriously difficult to referee because, in comparison to other sports, there’s more open play and random instances. It’s a big field to marshal etc. In the recent World Cup, we heard complaints about poor refereeing after most games. That is from supposedly the best of the referees internationally. Moreover, complaints about refereeing in both Scotland and England are constant. It does seem to be the case that there are more regularly poor decisions in Britain than in Spain, say. But competence or not doesn’t seem the best explanation. It seems that the game is easier to referee in places where the game is more technical. If the game is about the ball on the deck: dribbling and passing, it will flow more and fouls and faults are easier to spot. If the game spends more time with the ball in the air, played at a faster pace, there’s more chaos. This will lead to more fouls and faults and the more of them there are, the higher chance of there being poor or contentious decisions.
You need to bear in mind that Celtic fans made regular complaints about refereeing decisions in this season’s Champions League. I’m a season ticket holder. I was there, I heard them in real time; I read and heard them in the aftermath.
The patterns re Celtic and Rangers in recent season are observable. Watch for them. I’m sure the Huddle Breakdown guys have also spoken about them. As I might have said elsewhere: the numbers involved are not enormous. In some ways looking at or for a quantitative picture is daft when you can look at the qualitative evidence. How many penalties awarded to Rangers were clearly wrong? How many should definitely, objectively have been awarded against them that weren’t (the YW says we can dismiss the Goldson one, say, that wasn’t objectively definite – Beaton didn’t give it, the practicing Catholic VAR ref didn’t give it, the Celtic supporting fourth official didn’t weigh in…)? Etc. That wouldn’t take that long. You wouldn’t be dealing with massive numbers. You’d also have to attempt to be as objective about decisions given for or against Celtic. Much better to ask a Rangers fan’s opinion on that, say.
As for bias, I think more things need to be made explicit in that discussion if you wish to discuss it seriously:
Three top flight officials are Catholics. Two are almost certainly Celtic fans. Declaring allegiances: a good idea which I support, but even in England where this exists, there is nothing prohibiting referees officiating matches of their own team’s rivals. The Scottish situation is much more the European norm. Most European leagues are dominated by a small number of relatively large clubs. Ajax fans absolutely CAN officiate Ajax matches. Same for Zagreb fans. In those countries, like here, the demographics would make it almost impossible to produce referees if you made that a rule.
I could go on.
But put all of that on the table. Put any ref issues Rangers fans have on the table. Put any ref issues fans of other clubs have on the table (the argument that both Celtic and Rangers get disproportionately favourable decisions compared to the others, is also there if you’re looking for it). Put everything on the table: the arguments that suit you; the arguments that don’t. Listen very carefully to every credible counter argument to the position you hold. Then try to find a solution.
I did reply to this in detail, btw. Not sure why it hasn’t been posted; I don’t think I wrote anything improper. Other posts I’ve made since have been posted. I’m sure it’s just been overlooked, but in the interest of responding to your reasonable questions, and so you don’t think I’ve dodged it…
Thanks. Again, good well thought out reply.
Surely some conclusions must/can be drawn?
The conclusion (I don’t agree with though) I would draw from your points is….
The referring is as good as we can expect in a small country with a less technical game and there is no evidence of bias as everyone complains.
With regards to the three top referees being Catholic (I’m from Belfast, most practicing Catholics I know know little about Celtic), maybe it’s negative bias….?
Finally, and a total curve ball, how can Celtic fans not feel there is an agenda when you consider the EBT, resolution 12, Jim Farry etc etc issues. Why would referring be any different
The “very little time to react” hasn’t been applied to Bernabei & O’Riley situations. It could also be argued they knew even less about it than Goldson. Yet both pens were given. Consistency is key to any application of the rules.
David – in both the cases you cite the YW has ruled the penalty decisions incorrect
Sorry. By consistentcy I meant our actual Refs- not YW.
If our own refs don’t give those previous 2, and then do not give the Goldson one, there would be little complaint.
That’s the real issue. Most are deliberately removing that context to paint it as conspiracy madness though.
This comment about a player going to ground in the box giving away a penalty automatically is rubbish.
Would a player be penalised if he mistimed a slide tackle and missed his opponent outside of the penalty area?
Why would a player who stands on his opponent’s foot not be penalised?
Very interesting as always. I was never in any doubt that the penalty awarded to Rangers was correct. I did think the Goldson handball should have been a penalty. The only thing making me pause for thought was how close it was. The angle shown repeatedly by Sky was the slow motion angle from behind. The side on view certainly shows that it was incredibly close. Given that the ball once struck must have been moving much faster than his arms could physically manage, his arms must have been in something like that position any way.
Would have been an interesting likely impact on XG had the YW gone the other way with this one.
The basic logic of the space-time-continuum would indicate that the only thing we know (or can assume) with (any) certainty is that had this penalty been awarded, we would not have scored the actual equaliser we did score. The chain of events that followed would have been too different. The likely outcome of the penalty being awarded would have been an earlier equaliser. That would have given us more time to score a winner. What would the probabilities of that been?
That’s assuming we would have scored it and our conversion rate from the spot is poor, no? McGregor’s record as a penalty stopper is good?
This whole issue would have been more interesting had:
1) There been any meaningful case against the penalty awarded to Rangers (gleeful images of the ‘injured’ Rangers player are a big load of nothing – players, not least our own, ‘celebrate’ ‘winning’ penalties whenever they get the chance.
2) Had the Goldson handball been for a penalty which could have won Celtic the match, rather than brought about an equaliser, which came anyway.
Can’t agree with the YW here, but isn’t that the point. Asking someone to look independently and without my green tinted specs on.
However, at the time I said that I thought the Goldson handball pen (based on what I think should be a pen) would be soft, but you end up screaming for it because of the Bernabei and O’Riley handball’s given as pens.
So perhaps the key for me here is to accept the glaring difference of opinion I have with the YW with respect to the analysis of this game; but to consider the trend analysis to see if a statistical bias (deliberate or otherwise) exists given an independent reviewer and the actual refs/VAR.
Perhaps another statistical review is the differential between Lanarkshire referees (or referees with known allegiances as per Paul Larkin’s study) and refs from the rest of the country
Who are the Lanarkshire referees? This doesn’t seem to be easy information to find. I’ve always assumed it included Collum, say, who’s a practicing Catholic and has spent most of his career as a teacher in Lanarkshire Catholic schools. But, he comes in as ‘Glasgow’. From what I’ve heard (and absolutely believe, based on who’s told me), Robertson and Clancy are certainly Celtic fans. Robertson, incidentally in the same year group at the same school as Aiden McGeady. Both of them listed as ‘Glasgow’. Beaton (obviously, almost certainly a Rangers fan) is ‘Glasgow’.
My issue is that even if everything could be made more transparent, I wouldn’t trust the bulk of the people making the complaints not to carry on making them. I think a lot of my fellow Celtic supporters are just bad faith actors on this issue. And we’re looking to other parties (other clubs, the SFA…) to make a move, make a deal, make an improvement. Ever tried making a deal with bad faith actors?
At a game the other week – think it was the St Johnstone game – the Hatate goal was reviewed towards the end of the match and a sizeable chunk of my side of the ground started chanting that the referee’s a ‘orange bastard’. His name’s KEVIN CLANCY ffs! We overlooked that in the same game a perfectly onside St Johnstone goal was initially called for offside, before being reviewed. Is that not better evidence of bias? An almost certainly Celtic supporting ref wrongly penalising Celtic’s opponent?
Having had time to reflect & read other comments, and as much as I respect to the YW’s opinion, I am more confused than ever.
He states that Goldson had very little time to react, but also that Goldson DID react to the shot.
Surely the “short distance” defence for handball is being used in reverse here?
Either he had no time to move his hands away & the ball struck him at zero range (ball to hand)
OR
He had time to react & raised his hands to protect his face (hand to ball)
The YW steps around this by simply saying that this reaction did not change Goldson’s body shape as it “is the normal expected body shape specific to that particular situation”.
In other words, had the ball not hit his hands it would have struck his face which the hands were protecting.
In other words, Goldson deliberately moved his hands towards the ball to deflect it.
Once he moves his hands deliberately towards the ball the “body shape” defence is irrelevant.
That defence can only apply if the ball strikes a passive hand or arm that doesn’t enlarge the body shape.
In this case, it is obvious that the movement is hand to ball and, regardless of whether its was to protect his face or his genitalia, it is deliberate handball and a penalty.
The absence of a VAR referral by Collum seems more crucial than ever.
No mention of Goldston due a red card then?
Just a quick summary.
Since season 2018 to date.
Celtic- 19 penalties against 27 penalties awarded 96 goals conceded 367 goals scored
The Rangers- 7 penalties against 35 penalties awarded 100 goals conceded 328 goals scored
As a ratio of goals conceded against penalties conceded Celtic are roughly x3 times worse off.
As a ratio of goals scored against penalties awarded Celtic are roughly x1.5 times worse off.
That is quite telling to me. Is that from season 18/19 or 17/18? Presume the former.
4.5 seasons
The Rangers with 29.6% more penalties for awarded and 63% less awarded against them
Yes, but my response to Paul Revere CSC above shines a light on individual seasons. There are one or two seasons in the time period you’ve focused on, for some reason, which massively skew the mean. When you look at it on a season to season basis and with any attempt at objectivity or an openness to other explanations, it’s hard to genuinely convince yourself of the pattern most Celtic fans seem wedded to in the first instance.
What made you choose 2018 as the starting point? Rangers were in the league a couple of years before then. Allegations of anti-Celtic bias predate that by decades. Why not go with the overall pattern from the turn of the century where the link I provided in the other post let’s you gather the figures?
I didn’t have enough time to go back further today ????
If I get a chance I’ll go back to when the rangers got promoted.
It will change the pattern somewhat. If you go back to the beginning of the century (and why not), it changes completely.
‘Relatively straightforward decision here as Starfelt slides in for a tackle and his trailing right foot clearly catches the right boot of Sakala and sends him to the ground. Starfelt is fully committed to the sliding challenge and does not get near the ball. A foul is committed.’
But it is not straightforward. On decision 1 – The language here to describe the foul – ‘no foul’ is an error. Starfelt’s trailing foot – it is his front foot! ‘Clearly catches’ another error. Sakala steps on Starfelt’s right foot and this is what brings him to ground.
Let us just suppose for a moment. What if Sakala stepped on Starfelt’s face? Is there any difference in the rules related to which body part is treaded on. If anyone clearly studies the film on this supposed foul the outcome is no penalty. Furthermore, later film shows Sakala having a good laugh laying on the ground with his supposed injured leg. It’s simulation and Sakala is cheating! The second penalty, I will not even discuss.
Good points
If I remember correctly, Albertz foot connected with Lambert’s face, knocking several teeth out.
Decision? Penalty Rangers, so no difference in the rules, or should I say, Scottish interpretation.
Hi Cha. I was notified of your comment about me on one of the other sites. I have actually made several other posts on that thread clarifying my own position and (I think politely) challenging the views of others (I’d thought it was ok to do that). The moderator of that site has not posted my responses, though he has posted his responses to me (suggesting that they are unanswerable) and the responses of others (suggesting I’m stumped). It is of course his prerogative to do so, though I thought it a little cowardly.
I suppose I’m presuming that the moderator of this site will allow this comment to be posted. No big deal if they don’t though. You’re likely to think what you think of me regardless. But in the interests of healthy debate among the Celtic community etc.
You did misspell my name, which I’m not precious about (the ‘en’ spelling is a little more common). But given that you gave me the inverted commas treatment (not sure why my particular first name would be a good alias), I thought it worth pointing out.
I presume that the implication is that it’s not my real name and/or that I’m not actually a Celtic fan because I disagree with the consensus on this issue. The moderator of the other site is in possession of a number of posts where I make this as clear as can be. He has my email address with my full name. He could email me and have a photo of my season ticket in section 438 which I’ve had for ten years, if he wanted to clarify the issue. I only mention this because it was cheap of him to use the inverted commas when the information was freely accessible to him, as it could be to his readers, had he chosen to post my comments. This would not sway anyone, of course. It would just clarify that I’m a Celtic fan with an honest but contrasting opinion, rather than some Sevco-supporting troll.
The same option is wide open to the moderator of this site too.
In any case, I disagree with your précis of the discussion we had on this thread. But that is not the reason for this message. My posts from January are here for you to re-read if you would like.
Best,
Damian
I’m baffled, going blind or daft!!!!
What i see is Starfelt sliding in making no contact with ball or player and Sakala putting his down on top of his foot, which resulted in him falling down.
In any other part of the pitch this would be deemed as a coming together and going by his rraction whilst dying on the ground, pumping his fist and laughing, he played for it.
I’m with the previous correspendent that the English Whistler is not impartial as he goes with the establishment almost all of the time.
Whilst I agree the Sakala incident is a penalty due to Starfelt sliding in recklessly the fact is he doesn’t catch Sakala planted boot but rather Sakala plants his boot ON TOP on Starfelts boot which is of course is in motion.
Goldson has a habit of raising his arms in games regardless but like most Rangers players doesn’t seem to get punished for it.
Guarantee if that’s Carter Vickers or Starfelt the ref points straight to the spot.
The issue isn’t whether the decision is the correct one it is how they are applying the same rule differently depending on who the team is.
That’s the real issue here.
Here’s my take on the Goldson non-penalty. Both hands were raised. Both hands were in an unnatural position. If protecting the face is a defence, can we now expect all players in a defensive wall to raise their hands to protect the face? Obviously not. It’s the inconsistency that really bothers me.
Hail Hail.
Starfelt doesn’t touch sakala, sakala stands on starfelts foot, sakala lies holding his thigh & hides his little celebration from the ref as he knows he’s conned him, a few secs later up he jumps to celebrate with team mate & the klan & no sign of injury, for me this is worse than goldson incident
Regarding the Goldson penalty claim not given. One of Ange’s main points was, had Starfelt or CCV made the same save (protected their face), would John Beaton have awarded a penalty to The Rangers? I speculate he would have pointed to the spot before the ball had cleared the bar. I also believe VAR would not have overruled.
That’s interesting. I’m a Celtic fan and suspect these things too. But can we do anything with this? Is there a meaningful basis for such speculations that wouldn’t be laughed away by any objective party (bearing in mind that no one who’s reading any of this thread is going to be any such thing – unless the YW checks in himself)? The match referee for this game is almost certainly a Rangers fan (admittedly, I’ve never seen what you could seriously call hard evidence of that). The VAR official absolutely is not.
Maybe this is just a ‘poor us’ thing.
I think what YW is indicating is a gut animal human reflex is in play – ie if you trip up your hands automatically fall in front of you to protect. You don’t think it just happens. . There’s no conscious decision, a relex action does it .. if it was 3 yards away or more the player has time to make a decision and can make unnatural movement and that would have been a pen . Intention is the key here he reflexively is trying to protect his face and in a way he has no conscious decision over . Therefore no pen
Greg, Not sure if you’re saying No Pen or you’re paraphrasing what you think is the YWs view.
The notion that we can interpret Goldson’s intent is nonsense.
The defence of the clogger was always “Nae intent ref” it was crap then & still is now.
The actions determine what view the referee should take, not putting himself in the mind of the player who’s just fouled.
We’ve all looked at this video from every angle & it is very clear that Goldson
a) never takes his eye off the ball
b) blocks the shot with his raised leg & boot & simultaneously
c) starts to raise both arms/hands to move them between the Starfelt & his upper body
d) as the ball is kicked he pushes his hands upwards & his hands deflect the ball over his head
His actions are deliberate & he moves his hands towards the ball & made sure they made contact with the ball. He had plenty of time to turn his head or his upper body if he was scared of the ball hitting him anywhere.
To attribute to him something that he was thinking at that moment so as not to award a penalty is the biggest stretch of indulgence I can think of.
There is absolutely NO defence to deliberate hand ball if he or others claim he was protecting his face or any other part of his body. As others have said, that would be a precedent that every defender was use after a handball.
It was a stonewall penalty.
Beaton is dealing in the live action & can be forgiven for not being sure as to what part of his body deflected the ball, but Collum is badly at fault for not scrutinising the incident properly before he gives feedback to Beaton.
Lastly, we cannot say the ball was so close that he had no chance to react & so the ball hit him AND at the same time say that he had time to react & raise his hands so that they deflected the ball away from the goal (instinctively or not) but that his deliberate hand to ball movement was involuntary. In essence, this is two bites at excusing a player for handball & is a charter for cheating
These two assessments are contradictory & mutually exclusive.
The YW managed to get both into his summary & I think he’s totally wrong in his comclusion.
HH
Heard a Killie fan on the radio saying that they should have had a penalty in the opening minute (I turned up a few minutes late; didn’t see that) and that there was a handball in the Celtic box in the build up to our second goal. Didn’t spot that either, but the person next to me said ‘if we score here it will be ruled out’; we scored two seconds later. Will both of these be referred to the YW?
Paul Revere CSC – the onion layers of our conversation thread seem to have maxed-out. I only mention the three Catholic refs, two of whom are almost certainly Celtic fans, because it’s a detail that’s largely and (I’d argue) wilfully ignored by Celtic fans who raise hell about this issue. Similar to Celtic fans I’ve seen in recent weeks keen to highlight the pattern of penalties over the last five years, because it suits their argument; the pattern over the last twenty years (which, if Farry’s on the table seems a reasonable timeframe) generally isn’t presented. If you’re a good faith actor, then everything’s on the table – including the Kilmarnock fan claims from today.
On your final question, why would those things mean that refereeing is necessarily the same? It might be. But you’d have to be properly open to considering other explanations: referees who are absolutely not Rangers fans, patterns of play which lead to penalties gained/conceded (particularly on this site, where analysis is the remit), the fact that this season and in a number of recent seasons, there are sides in the league who have gotten more penalties than Rangers.
That there is evidence of wrongdoing in one area doesn’t necessarily mean that it is everywhere. You ask a reasonable question about why Celtic fans should believe this. But why should anyone else believe the claims of Celtic fans, when there are credible counter arguments? Being a Celtic fan does not in itself bestow any closer relationship to objective truth. It’s not a virtue.
I think also that this whole thread is hugely revealing. The YW experiment, to be clear, is: Alan, a Celtic fan we all trust and admire, acquiring the services of an experienced referee who knows the rules and is not a supporter of any Scottish football club. Aside from also allowing Rangers fans / fans of other Scottish clubs to propose incidents for him to look at, it’s about as objective a model as there is. He says that both of the big decisions on Monday were correct. The response from Celtic fans on here is that THEY, who are absolutely biased in every conceivable sense of the word, know better. That the YW is wrong! You’re not dealing with good faith actors at that point. You’re not dealing with people who could ever accept that they are wrong. Their own bias is all that matters to them. Their own bias is their warped, Trumpian truth. So, the debate is pointless. That’s why you can’t expect it to get better.
A fair point. We can’t as a fan base want impartiality but also be annoyed when that means they don’t agree with us. I think had we not seen some horror handball decisions pre World Cup (O’Riley’s may be the single worst case since VAR came in, for many reasons) nobody would even be talking about this Goldson one.
Alas for fans, decisions do not occur in a vacuum. My suspicion is that the outrage over these terrible handball decisions already led to a rethink during the world cup and what we’re seeing as “inconsistency” now might well be down to that. Data too limited to tell yet.
I’m not sure what people think Sakala celebrating his side getting a penalty in a Derby match is supposed to prove, but I’m fairly certain it does no such thing.
Of course it doesn’t prove anything. Never seen a Celtic player look pleased when we’ve been given a penalty? If you think you can see the future in tea leaves, then that’s what you think.
Your post is well made with good points.
You seem to have a disturbing rabid Rangers fan level of inordinate fixation on “Catholic refs” and draw the same warped conclusion as them ie they must be Celtic fans and biased towards us.
Strangely I don’t recall any pictures of them in Celtic pubs celebrating a wretched performance for us against them, ex-Season Ticket holders, membership of virulent anti-Protestant organisations etc.
Any such instances would be all over the Internet and amplified by our ever-willing media but strangely I don’t recall them, not even as a 5yo in a green and white top, so perhaps you could enlighten me.
Also can you highlight the Beaton level performances of these Catholic referees that benefitted Celtic and penalised Rangers.
If you can’t then its simply innuendo and anti-Catholic paranoia that is rampant in the most deranged Rangers fans.
I’m attempting to balance the view that I’ve heard my entire life that referees are obviously Rangers fans and/or biased to Rangers even in instances where there is no (or only very poor) evidence.
Don Robertson was at the same school as I was. I know people who knew him well. The same year group as Aiden McGeady (an incidental and unimportant detail). From the people I know who knew him, I am pretty sure he is a Celtic fan. He was definitely a youth player at St Mirren (a goalkeeper, I think) and I think he officiated St Mirren’s victory over Celtic this season. But that particular avenue of bias doesn’t seem to bother anyone terribly.
I’ve heard convincing personal accounts that Kevin Clancy is a Celtic fan. I have no reason to disbelieve any of the people who have told me that. Indeed, if you want to Google ‘Kevin Clancy Rangers fans’ you’ll find plenty of issues they have with him. They might be ridiculous and fanciful but not any less threadbare in their reasoning than most Celtic fan complaints against Rangers supporting referees.
Collum is certainly a practicing Catholic and his substantive professional post is as a principal teacher of RE at a Lanarkshire RC comprehensive. He is not, so far as I’m aware, a Celtic fan. I was told by people who worked with and were taught by him that he had absolutely no love for Rangers. I can’t quite recall, but I think he might be a Motherwell fan. He was in charge of the recent game at Fir Park with the highly dubious VAR call. But that particular avenue of bias doesn’t seem to bother anyone terribly.
Are there current referees who are members of virulent anti-Catholic organisations? I can’t recall seeing any evidence of this. Apologies if so.
Madden was a recent target for all of this. We all saw him give two penalties in the same game for Celtic against Rangers at Hampden (through a two-season spell where Celtic were awarded many more penalties than Rangers in general, including one season where Rangers had the tenth most penalties awarded in the league, despite finishing third/second). When you look back at that game, while both penalty awards are accurate, at least one could not have been given, had the referee been openly biased (I wouldn’t have given it at the other end, for instance).
My main motivation in this debate is that the bias angle is an intellectual dead end. I’ve posted quite a lot on this thread. If you’re interested, please read all of my posts.
Could I cut to the chase?
What would you like to be done? Is it practical? Why would it be better? Is it actually fair (as opposed to beneficial for Celtic)? Can you foresee any side-effect issues which could arise from the changes you would propose?
Bear in mind that YOU (like me) are absolutely biased, in every conceivable sense.
I don’t think that nothing should be done about this issue, I just think that everyone needs to try harder to operate in good faith. I know what I would like to be done, and why, and what I think isn’t worthwhile, and why.
I’m sorry for my Rangers fan vibes. I started going to Celtic matches in December 1989. I have had a season ticket in section 438 for the last ten years. I’ve had others elsewhere in the ground.
As a person more generally, one of my pet hates is poor arguments in favour of positions I am sympathetic towards (I don’t mind poor arguments in favour of positions I disagree with, for obvious reasons). In the context of football, I dislike it when I hear Celtic fans saying things I think are irrational or illogical; it entertains me when I hear Rangers fans doing those things. I also have a bad habit of not bothering to comment on Celtic-related articles where I largely agree with the content or the thread and where I would only be adding to the echoes in the chamber. I don’t see the point. So I only comment when I think differently from the main thrust of opinion, which might make me seem like a rabid Rangers fan.
I think that comes across. Unfortunately it’s 2023 and people on the Internet are suspicious of anything but confirmation bias. I have insider info on at least 1 of the refs you state is a celtifan and can confirm it to be true.
For all that the optics of Crown bar loyal Beaton are horrific… He didn’t have a terribly bad game at new year. At least he didn’t show bias. The penalty decisions have been independently judged accurate, and even if they weren’t… That’s more on VAR than him.
I don’t think any decisions on 2nd Jan were as bad as chopping off Wolves’ goal vs Liverpool, but that goes against the “only Scottish refs are bad” narrative we fall in to so easily.
I’m completely baffled by by your attempt at balance.
When Beaton had a wretched game, missing multiple opportunities to send-off Morelos, he decided to go to a Rangers pub after rather than lying low, which is what would be expected elsewhere after such a controversial performance.
In the interests of balance, can you point to similar behaviour from a Celtic supporting and/or Catholic referee?
Madden, McLean and others are acknowledged (ex?) Rangers Season Ticket Holders, with the former also running a Supporters Club for extra staunchness.
For balance, can you point to similar Celtic fan referee problematic associations (nb I don’t consider that being, or perceived to be, a Catholic is problematic although I acknowledge others might consider it to be (there’s a name for such people)?
The problematic behaviour of Beaton, Madden, McLean etc leading to perceptions of bias is wide ranging hence hence the disquiet , so in the interests of balance can you list similar for the 2 alleged Celtic supporting referees and (bizarrely) the non-Celtic supporting but Catholic referee?
You’re also very selective in penalty counts, as penalties for and against need to be considered to get a full picture.
Everything else being equal you would expect the top team with most goals, fewest conceded, most attacks etc would have the most penalties given and fewest conceded.
Not only is this not the case, its almost consistently, year on year, a wide margin to the vastly inferior team.
This ‘statistical freak’ would seem to be something worthy of further investigation rather than a partial picture with a ‘nothing to see here, lets all move on’.
On your third from last paragraph, you might expect that but it’s not necessarily true. If it were true, you’d expect Celtic and Rangers to have the highest number of penalties awarded this season. I posted the link elsewhere, there are two clubs this season that have been awarded more than both even though those clubs spend far less time attacking opponents boxes than either Celtic or Rangers. If you examine the year on year, there are several seasons where there are clubs that are awarded more penalties than either Celtic or Rangers. If you look at Rodgers’ first season in charge, Celtic were awarded the most penalties by miles. Rangers were tenth in the league. They had a poor season, but they finished third. To be tenth on the penalties-awarded count seems weird, if your logic holds.
The current Rangers team has, for the last few seasons had players who either go looking for penalties or who play in such a way as makes them more likely. Kent, for example, is very good at dribbling in the box in such a way as invites rash challenges. He waits for the rash challenges to come and goes down like a tonne of bricks. It works, if that’s what you want to do and you’re good at doing it. Argentina were excellent at it at the World Cup, which is why they were awarded more penalties than any team ever has in any tournament, and quite a few more than France, who played the same number of games. On top of this, that Argentina team wasn’t even a terribly attack-minded outfit.
Celtic don’t play that way. Celtic players rarely touch the ball more than twice in the box. They pass or shoot as soon as they can. They retain possession outside the box, where they can have more control.
Rangers play a much deeper line than Celtic. Their defenders are better than most opponents’ attackers. That makes conceding penalties a less frequent likelihood. Celtic play a much higher line because of the manager’s preferred playing style. They also played a relatively higher line than Rangers under the last two managers. We have CBs who are good in many ways but not quick. We’ve had a succession of keepers who can’t cope with the space. From time to time that leads to chaos and situations where penalties are more likely to be conceded.
None of this bothers me because I’m a Celtic fan and despite these risks, Celtic score far more goals and concede far fewer than their opponents. The objective of the game is not to get penalties and score goals. I’d rather my team did that, even if the style of doing so carried risks. One of the risks is that we’re likely to get fewer penalties and concede more than Rangers do. But, on balance, I don’t care, because we’re much better than them. Let Kent pull his wee penalty-winning party pieces; Jota scores more goals.
If you go back to the MON years, say, the penalty award balance is in Celtic’s favour. Why is this? Were Hugh Dallas and co less biased? Or is it that that team played a deep line and a middle block, with a pretty conventional shape and discipline?
Balance isn’t the same as equivalence. My hectoring repetition on the Catholic/Celtic supporting refs for THIS audience (and thanks to Martin, above, for the backup) is that Celtic fans in this debate never say, ‘I know there are Celtic supporting refs, but…’, they insist that all refs are biased towards Rangers. Three out of the current top flight count is a pretty high percentage (there may be others). It’s as many as known Rangers fans. I sat at the St Johnstone game a couple of weeks back while thousands around me declared Kevin Clancy an “orange bastard” as he awaited on a VAR check for an incident which (rightly) went in Celtic’s favour. Minutes earlier he’d initially declared a goal for Celtic’s opponents offside, when it turned out to be clearly onside (high line, not especially fast CBs). Why was no one interested in bias there? And besides, why do you want anyone who is not a Celtic fan to take seriously a group of people who will call a Catholic, Celtic-supporting referee an “orange bastard” while in the process of making correct refereeing decisions. That’s not a good faith group.
You said that there are refs who belong to anti-Catholic organisations? Did I pick that up wrong? Are there?
I accept, as Martin says above, that the Crown Bar optics on Beaton are very poor. I looked up the incident again this evening. It seems to have been broken on VideoCelts? The story they told at the time was that he was photographed in the Crown Bar on the Sunday, following the match on the Saturday. I don’t know the pub personally, but I gather it isn’t much of a Rangers pub other than on match days. There are a few like that in my neck of the woods. I’ve watched non-derby Celtic matches in them over the years, and no one’s ever bothered me about it. So, the only substance of that story is that a man who is a Rangers
fan and a referee was in a not-Louden-Tavern-type Rangers pub the day after a game. The optics are bad, but it doesn’t prove anything.
There is a story about one of the Celtic supporting refs I’ve mentioned being spotted on a flight with friends who were singing rebs at the time. The story originated from Rangers fans obviously, just as the fury about the Beaton one centres entirely around Celtic fans. By indirect personal experience, I could accept that it could be true (there wasn’t any suggestion that he was singing the songs himself tbf).
Again, I’d ask what you’d like done about all of this? Is it practical etc?
I don’t deny that there are Rangers supporting refs and that they must be biased to some degree. If I were refereeing a Celtic match, I’d send opponents off for sneezing. But I’ve thought a lot about what I think the best case scenario improvements could be, what the costs would be, and what we’d have to live with.
Madden’s only public comments on this issue, that I’ve heard, immediately followed a derby match where he sent Morelos off for an incident he didn’t see directly, where he denied having a season ticket at Ibrox. He could be lying of course, but that would be a bigger issue than you allege. Certainly it would be strange for a top flight referee to literally have a season ticket for any club; he’d rarely make use of it, if nothing else. I can’t find any confirmation of him running a supporters’ bus (I presume it was he that you meant by ‘the former’), other than from Celtic fans. But, it’s not terribly important to me whether he’s a Rangers fan; I’m perfectly convinced that he is. What’s important to me is what should be done about all of this, and what we as Celtic fans have to accept as logical in the outcome.
Finally, in the English Premier League so far this season, Fulham have been awarded the most penalties, twice as many as Manchester City; six times the amount as Arsenal.
Last season, Manchester City received the most, but level with Chelsea who finished 19 points behind them, only one more than Crystal Palace, who finished in twelfth place.
I appreciate I haven’t taken the time to balance this picture with the penalties conceded, but by your logic, you would not expect even these patterns to be so.
I really don’t think penalty awards or concessions are the proxy you appear to believe them to be. Penalties are not awarded that often, relative to the game.
Just hypothetically, if there is an examination of wrongful throw-in decisions, one way or another, that would probably be a better proxy than penalties, given that throw-one are awarded far more often and there would be many more opportunities for referee bias to be expressed.
As it happens, in Celtic’s 4-0 defeat of Rangers at Parkhead this season, Celtic took advantage of a throw in which at least arguably should have been awarded to Rangers, while three Rangers players complained to a Rangers supporting referee about the decision, and scored the second goal of the match. The game was over as a contest at that point.
So the evidence of pro-Celtic referee bias is that in the 67th minute of a home game against St Johnstone when leading 4-0 a ‘clearly onside’ away goal was initially ruled out.
1) The call was made by the assistant, not the referee who you damn for bias without credible evidence.
2) With VAR it was a decision that was always going to be overturned, as it was a clear and obvious error.
3) 15 minutes before this a similar poor offside call was made against Hatate.
In the words of Leiber & Stoller, Is That All There Is?
Clearly, the Vatican needs to vastly up its game, if its to have a serious influence on Scottish football.
With regards to penalties, ‘style of play’ is an unquantifiable as opposed to stats such as points, goals for and against, possession in box etc.
No doubt it plays a part but to the grotesque distortion we see, isn’t credible but lets see.
Mentioned elsewhere the Penalty difference is +33 for them and +8 for us over the past 5 seasons.
If this can be explained by ‘style of play’ then a similar pattern would be seen in goal difference but, of course its not with them currently on +28 and us on +48, which is probably an accurate reflection of our domination in the 1st half of the season.
Of course, penalties, both for and against, are 100% referee influenced decisions, while non-penalty goals are largely not.
I think its quite clear how the ‘unusual’ imbalance on penalties has come about (clue: its not down to ‘style of play’).
I don’t think your last response is a reasonable interpretation of what I’ve written. But, perhaps I’ve asked for that by wind-bagging on so much.
I’m not alleging pro-Celtic bias. I’m attempting to insert factors into to Celtic fan dialogue on this issue which are generally ignored.
What makes you so adamant that none of the referees are Celtic fans? The claims I’ve made (and which have been supported partly by Martin) are based on indirect personal experience. I believe the people who have told me.
You’ve alleged that Bobby Madden is both a Rangers season ticket holder and a supporters’ bus coordinator, even though there is no actual evidence for this in the public domain (that he is generally a Rangers fan is not in question).
But, we’re going back and forth.
What would you like to see done about this? Do you think your proposals would be demonstrably better? If so, why? Could there be any unintended consequences?
Personally, I’d like a scrutinised system for declaring allegiances (quite how this would work publicly I’m unsure; we’re often told that English refs have to do this but there is no official public record of the allegiances; would that satisfy us? That refs declare allegiances as they do in England but that, as in England, none of us would get to know about it?). I’d like the points based system that we have for appraising referees to reflect poor decisions that favour the team they support (as is the case in Holland, say, where Ajax fans can indeed officiate Ajax matches – but if they make a poor decision which benefits Ajax they lose double the points in the ranking system). I’d like the points-based system to be made publicly available. I’d like the SFA to hold weekly press conferences where decisions can be questioned, defended, explained or apologised for. I’d like us to move towards full time referees within five years so that poor-optic extracurricular events can be more meaningfully controlled.
The fascination with the last five years, that’s been going around on Twitter over the last week or so is also interesting.
If you go back to the point where Rangers came into the league, it’s +32 for them, +17 for Celtic.
Just on penalties awarded, there are only one of those seasons (including the season we’re midway through) where Rangers have been awarded the most penalties in the league.
I said earlier that even using the English Premier League as a lazy comparison, penalty awards churn out pretty random data. They just don’t happen that often.
A reason for this might be bias. But the trend doesn’t come close to proving that, unless you’re only looking at the trend to find evidence of what you already believe.
I’ve never said that there are no Celtic supporting refs. What a strange comment.
You’re fixation with only penalties awarded and not conceded (Celtic 5 since VAR alone, Rangers 0 this season, which comes shortly after them going 18 months without 1) shows that you’re only interested in 1/2 the story and surprise, surprise ignoring the one that shows the gross distortion at its ugliest.
Its as ridiculous as your ‘example’ of Celtic bias above.
Sorry Cha, but I’m my last post above the one you made I specifically included penalties for and against since Rangers came into the league (the five year snapshot that’s being doing the rounds appears to rhetorically omit the two previous seasons because it includes a season where Celtic were awarded 11 penalties with three given against (one very wrongly at Ross County by a ref I am almost certain is a Celtic fan), while Rangers were awarded 4 with 2 against. Again, the pattern since Rangers have been in the league is Celtic +17, Rangers +32.
I also genuinely think looking at the MON years is interesting. It happens to be the earliest seasons the Transfer Market website has data for. Throughout those five seasons it was Celtic +24, Rangers +22. In two of those five seasons, Celtic were awarded more penalties than any other team in the league. This was the case for Rangers in only one of those seasons. Obviously therefore, there were two of those seasons where another, lesser, team was awarded more penalties than both (as is the case in four of the last seven seasons, including the season we’re midway through).
This might give you no pause for thought whatsoever or be of any interest to you at all. But, it interests me. Those were my most memorable seasons as a Celtic supporter, in a number of them I barely missed a game. It wasn’t the verdict at the time that Dallas and co were particularly fair/balanced/impartial etc.
I think this is relevant because the argument is that anti-Celtic bias from referees is long-standing and cultural. That might still be the case, but if that five year window at the beginning of the century (at the height of the EBT years and inclusive of two Rangers championships) is anything to go by, then it indicates that penalty decisions aren’t necessarily anything to go by.
Listen, it’s been fun. I’ve asked what you would like done about it in good faith. You don’t seem interested in that.
Take it easy; all the best.
HH
Raising you arms or using your hands to protect your face is not an acceptable reason or excuse. Let’s say there is a free kick and the defensive wall ‘instinctively’ raise their hands to protect their faces, would a foul be called? The answer is yes. The argument regarding making a bigger body shape must work in more than on one plane. Contact with your hands in a forward position, may not be seen in a silhouette shape but it has also increased the body shape.
The distance from the free kick to the defensive wall should be around ten yards. The distance between Starfelt and Goldson was not much more than two. The ball was moving faster than his hands could physically manage. It’s not possible for his hand to be where they were if they were not very close to that position in the first place. I don’t disagree with you on principle (and I certainly thought it was a penalty at the time), but you’re not comparing like with like.
I have to join the consensus of referring YW to the dubious decisions panel. 😉
“He only raises his arms instinctively at the last second”
This maybe simply clumsy language but the whole incident happens in a split second, so there is no time for him to adjust the position of his arms after the ball is hit.
As the ball comes between them he goes with his foot to block and also with his arms rising, which never deviate from this.
It looks a fine save to me and, if its not a penalty, then I don’t know why players disadvantage themselves by putting their arms behind their backs when they can simply put them in front of their face to block shots/crosses.
I do appreciate YW but we shouldn’t consider him infallible and without his own bias, perhaps as an ex-defender etc and if you compare with other ex-referees, there’s no unanimity unless its a simple interpretation of the rules.
What would be fascinating would be an xP metric, which would be difficult (impossible?), as its not a simple factual stat eg xG.
I’m sure if you analyse the EPL, notwithstanding the perceived big team/stadium favouritism, you’ll have difficulty finding a perfect model but would it be accurate in enough cases to justify its use?
Non-measurables like style of play, dribbles in box, leg-danglers, rash defending etc all play a part so do these negate the measurables?
Hi all and sorry to butt in
Respectfully, i think we are on the incorrect path if we are a) counting penalties or b) looking at whom refs support or what religion they are in isolation.
Penalties are rare events and therefore small samples. The question is not “how many” but always “was it the right decision” and “how many were not given that should have been”.
The outcome on counting will depend on when you start and end your sample.
On the refs and allegiance and religion. Firstly, i think it WOULD be prudent to have a register of allegiance and register of interests/conflicts. Of course. With penalties for misleading or falsehood.
But, think about your own work and those who work for companies/organisations. Irrespective of the religion or ethnicity, people generally fall in line with company culture and policy insofar as their performance and remuneration depend on it, or they leave.
The key aspect of focus is the culture of the SFA and what behaviours it drives. How do i get the big games? How do i get nominated to UEFA? How do I get more money? And what are the impediments to the same?
As you were, just my tuppence worth!
Thanks Alan. Apologies if I’ve been adding to the heat. My main gripe is that I’m really not convinced that the culture of the SFA (while opaque and amateurish) is what you (and most Celtic fans) appear to assume it to be.
I’d have to add that this is something of a changed, or at least developed, opinion on my part. I’m a Celtic fan from Glasgow. That the SFA and referees are biased against Celtic is just food and drink to me. It’s what I’ve heard for as long as I’ve been conscious of the game and I’ve actually never challenged my own assumptions all that much until I started following your Yorkshire Whistler series (I suppose that critical analysis and asking interesting questions can whet the appetite for deeper analysis and other interesting questions).
How do I get big games? Nominated for UEFA? Etc. Is an interesting way to think of things.
My feeling is that we as Celtic fans need to be willing to bring more into the daylight if we’re serious about these things. We need to be willing to look to see whether (or not) there is evidence of bias, rather than to see THAT there is evidence of bias.
If anyone comes at this acting on the assumption that the SFA has a pro-Rangers/anti-Celtic culture (and that refs will not rise through the ranks if they rock the boat) then they do need to be able answer to patterns which speak to the opposite. For example, I’m led to believe that in one calendar year (2019), Bobby Madden sent off seven Rangers players having officiated seven Rangers matches. I can’t seem to confirm this for definite, but I can confirm that in his Scottish refereeing career, he sent off three times as many Rangers players as Celtic players. This was in the early stage of the Gerrard tenure; his team had a horrible discipline record at the time. It makes sense, just in the face of it. But there didn’t seem to be any negative consequences for Madden at the SFA.
I also think that if we’re going to look at penalty patterns as a part of this at all, we’re as well to ask why the penalty balance was in Celtic’s favour throughout the five MON seasons. Was the culture of bias suspended? Has the culture of bias actually gotten worse? Is it actually an altogether recent phenomenon that didn’t exist two decades ago? Or is that just a red herring of a pattern to be paying much attention to?
Looking at the patterns for other leagues (EPL, La Liga, Serie A), the idea that penalty patterns will likely correspond with goals scored / conceded more generally does not hold true. In La Liga last season, Levante came top with +13 (conceding NONE) but finishing in 19th place and being relegated.
But the clear suggestion when we pass around penalty stats for the last five seasons (as opposed to the last seven, which are less stark and which mark from the point of Rangers’ entry into the league) is that it should necessarily be the case that Celtic as the generally better team throughout that period should necessarily have better stats on penalties.
So far as I can see, Celtic Football Club is, by miles, the most powerful and influential institution in Scottish football. Literally nothing (for better or worse) happens in our national game without Celtic at the centre of it. I may be naive with this. But I’m just not convinced on the cultural argument.
Damian
I go off the evidence and when it changes my opinion follows
The SFA have been caught operating against Celtic’s best interest on numerous occasions and the latest was the Jota offside debacle at Motherwell. The evidence points to wilful ignoring of the rules to damage Celtic and then a cover up of lies and obfuscation.
The SFA colluded and lied in cohort with Rangers for years to conceal EBTs and to grant a license for UEFA competitions the rules should have precluded. That is all public record and non actionable as a statement as it is verifiably true.
The SFA have not changed since those days and many officers such as Sandy Bryson remain in post.
If you have colluded to cheat the whole of Scottish football for over a decade, why would you blink an eye to a dodgy handball?
The SFA are a hostile organisation to Celtic interests (or more accurately, non-Rangers interests) and have been for decades – that is what the public data tells us.
Thanks for your response, Alan.
Yes, I agree with much (essentially all) of that. But none of it necessarily proves either that referees are practicing disproportionate bias against Celtic in on-field decision making (again, they didn’t in the MON years, or in the first two Rodgers’ seasons etc.) or that the culture of the SFA is as you insinuate (again, a referee who shows a disproportionate number of red cards to Rangers players in a single calendar year faced any consequences in terms of officiating big games or being put forward for UEFA etc.).
To my latter point, is part of Celtic fans’ dispute with their former CEO (and new chairman) not that he essentially did not press for Rangers to face the consequences for their blatant misdeeds? That, in essence, he was complicit in letting them away with it, wedded as he was to the Old Firm brand? In other words, in this area, the SFA may well have acted in defiance of the wishes of Celtic fans, but certainly not in defiance of the ‘interests’ of Celtic Plc, as determined by its key operators?
On the Jota offside, I completely agree. I just wonder whether the fact that, according to my information, the Motherwell supporting referee was an under-examined avenue of bias?
This whole series centres around referee bias. A lot of distortions and non-truths (unlike the ones you lay out above) get added to the debate as if they constitute credible evidence (Beaton in a nominal Rangers pub the day after officiating a derby, not on the day itself, according to the Celtic site that broke the story; zero evidence that Madden was a season ticket holder much less a supporters’ bus coordinator – which wouldn’t make sense anyway – throughout his time as a Scottish league official). This is irresponsible, and I think it needs to be challenged. There is a difference between evidence (like the cumulative effect of the YW series, or the specific context you apply above) and made up or distorted nonsense.
I also think that my fellow Celtic fans owe it to themselves and to each other to behave like grown ups in this debate if they wish any external party to care at all about anything they have to say. The mass declaration that a Catholic, almost certainly Celtic-supporting referee was an “orange bastard” while he checked a VAR decision, accurately, and in Celtic’s favour, is not the behaviour of a group of people with any sincere intention of being taken seriously.
…also, the untested assumption that penalty award balances will coincide with the quality of the team more generally, when this does not appear to be the case anywhere else, is also a fact (or at least, trend) that I felt needed to be aired in this context.