Willie Collum explains ‘the only reason’ Callum McGregor’s Celtic goal vs St Mirren was disallowed by VAR

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VAR continues to grab the headlines for Celtic in the video referees’ third season in Scottish football.

Ever since its introduction, VAR has created more talking points than it solves, especially for the Celtic supporters.

With the season only four games old, VAR has already impacted one of Celtic’s games after Callum McGregor had a goal disallowed against St Mirren on the opening day of the season.

And now, over one month on, Willie Collum has delivered his verdict on the decision of the video referee to chalk off the Celtic captain’s goal against Stephen Robinson’s side.

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What VAR said about disallowing Callum McGregor’s Celtic goal vs St Mirren

The goal was subject to a length VAR check and now those who were inside Celtic Park that day can hear why the off-field referee decided to chalk McGregor’s goal off.

VAR: “Is on field decision goal? Yeah. Checking on field decision of goal, Don.”

Right. So I need to see where just immediately before just this bit here. Just that wee bit there. I think he pulls his hand away and it’s fine.

“Can you show me high behind maybe? Show me again. That hits his arm immediately before he scores. So we’ve got to disallow the goal for a hand ball. It’s conclusive. I’m

“Watch it hitting his left elbow there. So, I need to disallow the goal.”

Willie Collum explains the ‘factual decision’ behind disallowing Celtic’s goal vs St Mirren

When asked about the decision by VAR, Collum admits there is a case to argue against McGregor’s Celtic goal being disallowed.

Collum told The VAR Review, “Not for one second here are we saying this is a deliberate handball. You would even argue in law it’s not a punishable handball only in the circumstance that it leads immediately to a goal.

“That’s the only reason this is punished. If the Celtic player here, this exact same playing action takes place and he passes the ball to the side and somebody else scores, the goal is given.

“This is a factual decision based in the interpretation of the law that if a ball strikes any part of the arm which is a punishable part of the arm, in other words, below the T-shirt line and a goal comes, then it should be disallowed.”

Many fans felt the decision was harsh at the time and, looking at how the ball deflected off the Celtic captain, they probably still feel the same way.

With VAR here to stay and Collum speaking to Celtic and other SPFL clubs about improvements this season, let’s hope that there is a marked improvement on how the video referee is used in Scottish football moving forward.