Rangers: BBC Sport pundit angered by ‘completely unnecessary’ SFA decision, drops ‘conspiracy’ verdict

Rangers: BBC Sport pundit angered by ‘completely unnecessary’ SFA decision, drops ‘conspiracy’ verdict

Although Kenny Miller believes the Rangers made a mistake in asking Willie Collum to stop playing in their games,

he criticized the SFA for making a “completely unnecessary” decision.

More than a week has gone since the Gers lost to Celtic 2-1 at Celtic Park in a heated Old Firm encounter that left

them incensed over the decision to not award Alistair Johnston a penalty.

While Collum was on VAR duty, he determined that there was no case to answer. However, the scenario was further

complicated when it was revealed that Abdallah Sima had been offside during the build-up, which would have

nullified any penalty call.

Rangers have met with refs chief Crawford Allan and have asked for the VAR audio to be released. Miller, though, thinks the SFA fuelled theories of “conspiracy” and “bias” by putting up the images of the offside.

“I don’t like seeing referees being put under pressure. Are Rangers correct to ask for an explanation of what actually

happened? Absolutely. But they can’t dictate to the SFA who’s going to referee their games,” he told the Daily

Record (6 January).

 

In Scotland, we have a strong sense of devotion towards our clubs and our sport. It’s acceptable to feel displeased

with decisions that go against your club. If an error has occurred, though, you have to assume it was a sincere one. If

we don’t, our issues are much more serious. However, by exposing the offside lines following the incident, all it

accomplished was crack open a can of worms and spark conspiracy or prejudice ideas.

Spot on

There are a lot of moving parts to consider here, so let’s dissect what we can.

First of all, should a handball have been awarded? Overwhelmingly the answer is yes. Would it have been overturned

anyway? Again, yes.

But the process involved was an absolute shambles there is no hiding from that fact and Rangers absolutely do

deserve answers from the SFA over the process involved.

Having said that no club can start requesting which officials do not oversee their games, to be honest it made the

club’s hierarchy look a little bit silly at a time when they held the moral high ground.

However, the SFA did themselves no favours by showing the offside stills. Collum felt, rightly or wrongly, it wasn’t a

penalty and that should have been the end of it. The waters were completely muddied by doing what they did.

It is really unfortunate that even after a week, we are still discussing this because everyone involved handled it so

poorly. It’s that simple: everyone needs to perform better.

In other Rangers news, the team may lower a player’s contract by £5 million in order to recruit him from the

Eredivisie.

 

 

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