People are still discussing Andy Halliday’s challenge on Patrick Roberts from last weekend’s Old Firm semi-final clash at Hampden.

The tackle was late and reckless but the Rangers midfielder only received a booking. Even diehard Gers fans must have thought it merited a different colour of card.

Celtic fans, players and some in the media have suggested that the SFA should look at this challenge plus the punishment and decide on rescinding Scott Brown’s red card, the Celtic captain received his marching orders a week beforehand against Ross County.

Now I think Scott Brown is without doubt the best Scottish midfielder playing in Scotland’s top flight and has been for at least the past five years (probably longer). He showed all of his qualities in that win over Rangers as he dominated the midfield area.

But Brown’s tackle at Dingwall against Liam Boyce was worthy of a red card, it was a late lunge that could’ve injured his opponent.

Brown has a history of trying to dish out instant retribution if he feels something hasn’t gone his way or if a player leaves a foot in on him and the officials have missed. At times he goes in hard but fair but sometimes he crosses the line and against Boyce he mistimed the tackle and didn’t seem to be in full control, so for me it was a red card offence.

We can’t have a system that decides we can’t punish wrongdoers because others have done similar and escaped punishment. If we do that then we set at dangerous precedent and it will be hard for the SFA to punish any player as they will always say ‘but what about them?’.

That seems to be the argument that Patrick Roberts is going with and I understand why. Roberts was the player at the other end of Halliday’s poor, rash tackle and he knows that Scott Brown is a massive part of the Celtic machine.

Hoops boss Brendan Rodgers has also stated that the club have appealed the red card because of inconsistencies:

“We have the same referee who made the yellow card decision against Kieran Tierney, so with the consistency with the decision making that’s why we are appealing it.”

Again I understand Brendan’s frustration with referees and their lack of consistency. His job is based on results and bad calls from the officials can cost his team points.

But instead of trying to use these inconsistencies to your own advantage, I think we need to do more to help referees and try and limit their mistakes.

In that regard instead of rescinding Brown’s red card because Willie Collum missed the seriousness of the Halliday challenge, the SFA should have the power to upgrade Andy’s yellow to a red and have him serve a suspension. We can use retrospective action to deal with diving and the like, so why can’t we use it for calls that refs clearly get wrong?

I’d also like the SFA to look into bringing in instant video assistants, who can help the officiating team on match days. The technology is now at a stage where they can reach these decisions in no time at all.

In summing up I suppose the old adage ‘two wrongs don’t make a right’ springs to mind.

So Scott Brown should lose his appeal and serve his punishment. But we should demand more from those running Scottish football and have them back their referees with more technology to help them limit their mistakes.

At the very least we should have a governing body that can rectify those mistakes when they happen!

Posted on April 26th, 2017 by scott
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