Another day and yet another blog about Scottish footballing officials and the Scottish Football Association (SFA).

After the Josh Meekings scandal, where the Inverness Caley defender saved the ball on the line using his hand, we’ve had a week of blame and counter blame. Followed quickly by the SFA bumbling over the rules and looking extremely foolish.

Today, Celtic coach Ronny Deila (whose team lost out to Caley Thistle) has called on referees to explain themselves to the media and managers after the game.

I have always thought that was a good idea.

As Ronny says…

‘Why not?’

Everybody who watches the Scottish game will know that certain teams don’t trust the SFA and managers constantly moan about the officiating.

I hate constantly berating refereeing teams, they do have an extremely tough job (one I’d not like to do). But we can’t just sit back and accept inept performances.  This season our games have been almost ruined by dodgy decisions.

If we can see referees come out ten or fifteen minutes after a game and answer three questions regarding the game, it could calm a lot of fans down. It could help the referees, if we get see them talk about their decisions, it may have us thinking that they are human after all.

What is the need for secrecy? Why do the SFA need to know what happens before the fans do?

See this is my constant bugbear with the Scottish Football Association, they never seem to listen to the shareholders of the game… THE FANS!

At the end of the day the football supporter is the lifeblood to any club or association. So why do they continually ignore the needs/wants of the fans?

If you have nothing to hide, then allow referees to explain their actions. We have seen it a few times in the past, but never enough. It all gets kept behind the doors and under the carpets at Hampden.

Transparency should always be embraced between those that run our game/clubs and those that pay to watch.

But the fact is this, the SFA have no appetite to be more transparent or innovative. They could help referees with instant replays but choose not to pursue that avenue. They could placate supporters by allowing refs to talk, but we’ll not see that either.

Alas, we are not surprised! This is the same Scottish Football Association that charge an arm and a leg so their supporters can have the privilege to watch their own national team, a team who haven’t qualified for a major final in the last seventeen years.

They look back at their wallets, rather than look forward to a brighter, more transparent future that fans could get behind!

Posted on April 24th, 2015 by scott
Filed under: Article