Celtic undoubtedly deserved their victory against Hearts in the Scottish Premiership on Saturday.
Goals from Arne Engels and Luke McCowan sealed a 2-0 win to extend the Bhoys’ winning streak to six matches at the start of the 2024/25 season.
After the game, Hearts boss Steven Naismith wasn’t happy with the use of VAR during the fixture feeling that Celtic shouldn’t have been awarded the penalty to allow Engels to score.
James Penrice clearly handled the ball in the box. Still, Naismith compared it to an earlier incident involving Liam Scales despite – on that occasion – the ball hitting the Celtic defender above the ‘t-shirt line’. In both instances, the officials eventually made the right call after video reviews challenged the initial on-field decisions.
After the Tynecastle manager made his feelings clear to the media, Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers shared his full thoughts on the two incidents and got his verdict spot on.
Brendan Rodgers on Celtic penalty flashpoints vs Hearts
He said in a press conference [Celtic Way]: “It’s hard for Steven because he knows the first goal is so important in the game. If it goes to them, then Hearts have something to hang onto. If it goes to us, then the climate of the game changes.
“When you look at it, the rules are pretty clear, both were grappling and the ball came over onto his sleeve. In everyone’s book that’s not a penalty, but you want it. I can understand that.
“Likewise [on the second incident], the law tells you that if your arms are up away from the silhouette, then that is a penalty, and that’s how it worked out. There’s always a feeling if you don’t get it and the other team gets it then it’s a bit harsh, but I thought that the referee and officials did really well in those two moments.
“I trusted the referees to have a look at it. You can’t connect the two, the referee did well with the decisions. The people in VAR have looked at it. Just because one team doesn’t get one, doesn’t mean the other doesn’t too. By the letter of the law, one was a penalty and the other wasn’t.
“That’s why we have VAR. I think that he made his decision because it’s quick-fire. When the arm is out he sees it as a hand-ball. It’s the reason why we have VAR in place because the guys in the studio will look at it and think ‘not quite’. Similar to how our goal was disallowed – that was a really good call. It was just a fraction offside, but it was offside. I thought the officials worked really well.”
VAR worked the way it was supposed to
There’s been a lot of criticism for the way technology has been used by referees in Scotland but there’s no use having a go when they apply the laws given to them correctly.
In these instances, VAR worked exactly the way it should. Yes, it’s unfortunate the referee initially got both calls wrong on the pitch but he admitted his errors with pitchside reviews.
Nobody is saying that Hearts weren’t unfortunate. We’re talking about inches of ball movement in either direction and a penalty may have been given to them and denied to Celtic. It’s fine margins but there can be no complaints about the final decisions.
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