This seems an appropriate day for Scottish football to solemnly remember.
However, I am not referring to the annual Poppy Porn that now seems to have reached North Korean levels of compulsion among the Brits.
Rather, I am asking you, dear reader, instead to recall some other stuff about the SFA.
That is why the featured image is the late Jim Farry.
He made the mistake of not factoring in that after Fergus McCann ousted the old board that Celtic was under new management.
Consequently, he probably never thought that delaying the registration of Jorge Cadete would end up in litigation that would cost the staunch one his job at the SFA.
At the end of it all, there was a head on a spike, and it wasn’t wearing a bunnet!
It goes without saying that without a litigious type at Parkhead, this would never have happened.
Certainly, Farry would not have been undone by quality investigative journalism in Glasgow.
Don’t be silly!
Similarly, a dozen years ago, it took another outsider, this time your humble correspondent, to break the story that would see one Hugh Dallas, then employed by the SFA as their head of referee development, sacked.
The Guardian thought it newsworthy enough to commission me to write this piece on the scoop.
In the reportage of the Dallas story, this Fenian in Donegal was never mentioned by the succulent ones.
Then in 2012, we learned about what Rangers, under David Murray, had been doing for a decade in order to match Celtic.
Tax was not paid and ineligible players were an integral part of the scam.
Once more, it was outsiders (HMRC inspectors and the tribunal service) that died for the original rangers.
It should have been a teachable moment for the whole of Scottish football.
Instead, the local media discovered shadowy entities like “holding company vehicle” and, my personal favourite, “engine room subsidiary”.
The chaps at Hampden wanted to allow Charlie and the boys to package the body parts of the deceased club and present it to the Ibrox klanbase as the same Rangers.
I remember saying at a Q&A evening a decade ago something along the lines of, “knowing now what went on (EBTs etc.), what chance does a penalty or have?”
Or an offside decision?
Here on the ACSOM bulletin today, Alan Morrison of Celtic By Numbers tales the other panellists through issues around Jota’s goal in VAR gate.
He is correct in pointing out the red flags in this SFA statement.
One day this short offering might be a teaching aid to baby PR types at college:
“Now, this is what you DON’T do!”
As a journalist, my main function is to hold power to account, and I fulfil that public duty by asking questions.
You will note that I was recently in a presser at the Web Summit in Lisbon, where I put a pre-prepared question to the President of La Liga about the new Financial Sustainability Regulations.
Unlike UEFA, who are always courteous and prompt with me, getting anything out of the SFA has been a challenge since the Dallas days.
If I was in a presser at Hampden, this is what I would ask:
- What image did the VAR officials use to make a decision on the offside?
- Was it the same image used as was made public?
- Or does Hawk-Eye provide a different image for the consumption of the VAR referees?
- Can we see it?
- Given the available evidence, what did the VAR officials say to Willie Collum?
- Offside is a binary decision based on VAR technology. Given the lack of definitive player positional lines in the above image, how did Dickinson definitely know Jota was offside?
For the avoidance of doubt, what is at issue here isn’t the offside call per see, but rather the behaviour or the SFA after the fact.
This is now much bigger than an in-game decision.
It presents a challenge for Celtic’s new incognito CEO to step forward.
Cultural change in an organisation is almost always resisted.
In that sense, there is nothing new about VAR.
Celtic has to step up now.
Asking politely for clarification from the back of the bus simply won’t do.
Indeed, failure to do so will almost certainly be considered highly unimpressive by the club’s straight-talking manager.
It’s the sort of thing that, in time, could convince him to get a job where people actually had his back.
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I have said this before but it is worth repeating. I knew the deputy editor of a quality newspaper, a great man, and we used to team up at parties and compete for attention. Believing I was on secure ground, I was about to say that the Farry incident should never be forgotten and was all that was wrong about Scottish Football. I got half way through and I was informed quietly that Farry was his friend and he was a great guy. Given my friend’s background and the fight he had to get where he was I was rather taken aback. It partly explains the easy ride Farry has had with the media.
This is completely at odds with my recollections, which was that Farry was hated by the media as an officious petty bureaucrat and was a figure of ridicule up until Farry-gate.
After that he got almost universal sympathy despite being sacked for being corrupt.
That would seem to be the wrong way round but the clue maybe in the successful litigant.
I may be reading you wrongly, but I am saying my friend thought he was a great guy and not the media who only came round after he was found guilty as they closed ranks. I accept my last sentence was conjecture.
If I remember, Farry’s performance was so bad I believe his lawyer did the legal equivalent of throwing the towel in to save face.
Yes, I agree that Farry was given an easy ride by the media after he was found to be a lying cheat.
Looking forward to the SFA releasing the camera footage of the camera that wasn’t pointing where it should be.
Ive heard it’ll be released at the same time the sevcos rendition of sweet Caroline sans the F### the pope vocals is released.
32nd November is the date for your calendar
Like my brexit vote, VAR is exposing the lying cheating establishnent charlatans for what they really are
What’s wrong with the 31st?
Phil, our match officials have to be called out now.
Once again VAR did usnno favours today. A dubious penalty awarded against us whilst a more solid call at the other end saw the ref wave play on.
I don’t know if the officials were having a laugh when they decided that orange shirts were their choice for the day.
Our officials are useless. I cannot remember the last time I left a match thinking that the ref and his little helpers had got it right.
Despite the apparent anomalies throughout our officials here we are 9 points clear, 10 really if you bring in the goal difference.
The New Year fixture could see a further widening of the gap with Celtic going into the game in a confident manner whilst the opposition will be under severe pressure to close the gap.
If they were useless, they’d be useless at both ends
They’re not useless, they’re corrupt imho
It seems their is a lot of issues with cameras when it comes to issues regards Celtic
We recently had the non working CCTV cameras at Ibrox with the glass incident in the penalty box .
Although not recent, there was also the non-removed lens cap from the thrilling 8 goals we shared with our sadly, now departed, Glasgow rivals (not the Hi-Hi).
You’ve highlighted a possible / inevitable end game for CFC with VAR.
Ange is being diplomatic – for now.
What if another Jota-type ‘goal’ was disallowed against sevco – say in the Scottish Cup – and we lost by one goal?
Don’t think Ange would be quite as diplomatic in the post-game presser.
And who would blame him?
That could be when the Board comes under sever pressure, again, from the fans.
And Ange might have a public, direct pop at the Board / CEO too, for not supporting him – and the team?
Beginning to think you’re suffering from a persecution complex. How long are you going to harp on about the same oldl shit…. Even most Irish are bored with it and have moved on…me included.
Well said Paul, why even read and post, tell her I’ll be back same time your not there xx
Paul: We’ll get to the back of the bus. Or maybe not. You’re most definitely in the minority. Celtic fans have been dealing with unrelenting dodgy officialdom for decades here. This VAR freak-show hasn’t altered any of their blatantly corrupt decisions. Get educated.
Yep, I’m sure you speak for “most Irish”.
The Celtic support are treated as fools and have been for most of the club’s history. VAR is now highlighting it even more. Why on earth can’t football follow Rugby in letting the public hear the conversation between the VAR official and the match referee whilst the VAR decision is getting made. That would be too honest and revealing for the cheating Scottish referees and their SFA masters.
The Celtic Board have got to make it clear that their players and supporters can’t continue to be treated like fools. The supporters pay good money into the coffers of Scottish football. This should not be taken for granted by the SFA and maybe a boycott of Scotland games and refusal to free up Celtic players for International duty should be considered. The Celtic players are put in danger by the failure of Scottish referees to protect them every time they take to the field. The tackles on Giakomackis and Starfelt in the past two matches were clear red cards.
Sorry Phil I’ve followed and enjoyed your Blog for years but you have completely missed the point here.
Read the SFA statement again. “Determining that the Celtic player RECEIVED the ball in an offside position.”
Received the ball for god’s sake. Total bollocks.
That is not in the rules if football yet we have an organised charged with overseeing football in Scotland using it as an excuse for stiffing Celtic.
That’s what we are up against.
I think this is the starting point for determining an offside call, as Hawkeye draws its line based on the positions at that time.
The VAR then takes over rewinding frame by frame until you get to the point when the pass was played.
How the lines are then drawn, I’m not sure but I assume technology was involved.
Those who watched the All-Ireland Football Semi-Final between Derry and Galway will be suitably reassured as to the infallibility of the technology. 😉
Phil, please, I beseech you, do not encourage the use of the ‘-gate’ suffix at the slightest whiff of controversy. It’s been done to death for far too long and needs to be consigned to the literary dustbin. As a journalist and author yourself you should know to avoid clichés like the plague.
🙂
Why is the communication between the ref and VAR not made available to the fans, surely that would clear up any doubts we may have about cheating.
In fairness, it looked offside to me; Jota’s head is the furthest forward part of anyone’s body.
The complaint James is….The selected VAR camera has produced an inconclusive answer because of its position…. unless you’ve seen something definitive??
An accurate response is needed from “officialdom” to clear this up.
But irrespective of opinions, surely we shouldn’t be debating this kind of thing?
Isn’t that’s why VAR was introduced ?
Its utter nonsense IMO.
Ditto… but some people will never ever see what we see.
In fairness James, you’ve missed the point. Jota may well be offside. I don’t agree the image used confirms that. The point is that VAR has been introduced and we are supposed to believe it was conveniently not able to give a clear and definitive view of the incident? The benefit of the doubt is supposed to be with the attacker. There is certainly doubt. This in addition to 3 other incidents which Celtic have had against them leaves a whiff in the air. Also, as has been mentioned by many here, the rule is offside when the ball is played. You can’t be offside when you receive the ball, only when it is played. Now, while that may be down to the author of the statement’s use of language that in itself is concerning. Can whoever wrote the statement not get it factually correct?
It was interesting that when hearts got a late pen against Motherwell recently the incident was very similar to the one Celtic didn’t get Michael Stewart had absolutely nothing to say on the matter whilst previously going to lengths to explain why Celtic’s was not a penalty. Again, the point there was not the decision but why did VAR not ask the ref to even look at it? The goal Ralston scored was jostling by both players in the box. No VAR because the ref took that decision himself. So there we have 3 incidents where VAR could have been used and may have resulted in a decision in our favour and guess what? VAR is either not used or very conveniently not working correctly at that point.
We got a soft pen against Hibs. However, take the context of all the decisions. The 2 in the hearts game were at critical points. The one in the Dundee Utd game was and the one on the Motherwell game was. The pen we get, and which is reviewed by VAR, against Hibs was when we were coasting.
If the 2 Real Madrid ones, the Dundee Utd one and the one we got against Hibs, all VAR assisted, were pens then why wasn’t VAR used in the most blatant one against hearts?
There is a clear pattern here that a blind man at the wrong end of the pitch can see. Don’t use VAR, or use inconclusive VAR, when the decision may favour Celtic.
Maybe it’s our paranoia but I thought that only applied when there was lack of evidence. The evidence is clear here that selective VAR is being used and it seems to conveniently involve the same club.
JS
You are right that the Hearts penalty we didn’t get, and the Bernabei penalty were ridiculous decisions against us. The Ralston one was not a VAR issue; the ref (wrongly) blew for a foul, but that is not a decision that gets referred to VAR.
On the Jota goal, the linesman called it offside. It looked offside to me. I’ve seen a still that shows he is offside.
We can’t complain about every decision that goes against us, or else we look ridiculous. We need to stick to clear errors; Jota was not a clear error.
You have a fair point re the Jota ‘goal’ James. The assistant referee did flag for offside once the ball was in the net and there was no evidence to show that decision was a clear and obvious error, which is how VAR should work. A number of contributors on here seem to suggest that the benefit of the doubt should have been given to Jota because VAR failed to provide conclusive evidence to prove he was offside – sorry, that’s not how it works and that decision had already been made on the field, regardless of whether the correct angle was shown on TV screens (although that IS a rather spectacular shortcoming to say the least). What we DO need though is more transparency re the conversation between officials. Rugby and cricket have been doing this for a long, long time and it’s way overdue in football at all levels where VAR is in use. Indeed, at rugby matches (where it’s available) you can buy earpieces that allow you to listen to either the stadium commentary of the match or the ref mike for the entire game. Football lags seriously behind in that respect and, until it catches up, nobody could be blamed for believing that our parochial match officials had something to hide.
D, I agree that some of them have something to hide. But we need to choose our battles wisely.
You are wrong.
When VAR check’s an offside call then it’s the sole determining factor, as it’s a matter of fact.
Whether the on-field officials gave it or not, whether there’s a clear and obvious error, are irrelevant.
We don’t complain about every decision. Just these ridiculous “honest mistakes/teething problems”. Another absolutely preposterous one against Ross County. The time to complain is when you have won the game and they can’t call sour grapes. We need to keep highlighting these “mistakes”. We’ve seen them for years. We now have VAR which is supposed to eradicate these issues but only serves to confirm what we already knew. Some officials give a decision against Celtic at the slightest opportunity and are also reluctant to give correct decisions in our favour. There were 2 potential Celtic pens yesterday and a potential County red card.
You’re wrong, as the Ralston “goal” was referred to VAR (the ref stayed in the goal area for a couple of mins, listening to his earpiece, before being given the all-clear to award the free-kick).
If VAR had given the goal then Hearts would’ve been aggrieved, as the whistle had blown before. They wouldn’t have done anything different, if the whistle wasn’t blown, but that’s not the point.
This was a VAR issue in that the whistle should not have blown, as the issue should have been checked after the ball was in the back of the net.
No, you’re wrong. Blowing for a foul is not a VAR decision. Once the whistle was blown for Ralston’s ‘foul’ the game was stopped. There was no ‘goal’ to be considered by VAR. Had the ref not blown, the ‘goal’ would have been referred to VAR, and probably 🙂 allowed. If the referee did, as you say, stay in the penalty area and listen to his earpiece, it’s simply because he didn’t know the rules.
It’s worse than that, off side, on side, matters not… The issue is the camera that may or may not show jota offside was supposedly pointing the opposite way, pull they only one, it’s got the face painters invoice on.
SFA should at the very least release the full 90 minute recording from that camera to remove any doubt.
Then there’s th decision maybe from an image 60 yards behind the line, that simply cannot be used to confirm or deny anything.
There are real questions here that MUST be answered
If you’re basing that on the above picture then that wasn’t the angle that was used to decide.
I’m baffled as to how a 2-dimensional picture from 50-60 yards behind can accurately decide who was further forward.
As far as I know they don’t use 3D images ala Champions League, so have they factored in that Jota must have developed a significant protruding paunch during his recent injury absence?
If the referee has not given it originally and the VAR image is inconclusive then the player must be given the benefit of the doubt… unless it’s Hearts away. Also, as pointed out, it’s where you are when the ball is kicked, not when you receive it.
Three games in a row — that is a pattern.
I have no idea why the Board is so timid on these issues.
I think you’ve just saved Michael Nicholson having to draft a letter.
It is claimed that when “the player received the ball he was in an offside position”
Was he in an offside position when the ball was played forward to him, that’s what counts.
The one & only camera that is used by VAR world wide to determine if someone is offside or not wasn’t working! Queue a few minutes later when Maeda scored and was not called offside by the linesman every single camera on the ground was working perfectly to check every single angle if it was offside or not. Strange that!
The Motherwell CEO has stated there was a working VAR camera in the TV gantry on the halfway line but, not that, rather a camera from a far worse angle was used.
Although there looks to be more holes in the SFA story with every utterance remember, previously, Lawwell was given a smoking gun and still refused to fire it.
Although he’s now gone, it wasn’t through a popular revolt and probably his own choice, so to expect largely the same Grey Brigade to do things differently is akin to, sadly, believing in Santa Claus.
Or, indeed, the BBC.
Fair play to motherwell in all this