Simon Donnelly is fuming with ‘hugely frustrating’ VAR call at Celtic this weekend

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VAR really has been the bane of the Celtic supporters’ season this year, hasn’t it?

The refereeing technology was supposed to make officiating a lot easier and help to cut out the number of honest mistakes the SFA officials seem to make.

However, all VAR has done is create more controversy and confusion as the fans get exasperated at how teams are being inconsistently punished by the video referee.

Celtic have suffered more than their fair share of VAR mishaps. So much so that Brendan Rodgers got so angry, he is now facing a charge from the national association about comments the Celtic manager made about John Beaton.

And it seems that another decision by the video referee has really annoyed Simon Donnelly.

The former Celtic hero was commentating on Saturday’s 3-1 win over St Johnstone when he said the decision to deny Rodgers’ side a penalty has really frustrated him.

Simon Donnelly blasts VAR

The former Celtic striker was really unhappy about the decision not to award the Hoops a penalty after Daizen Maeda fired a shot goalbound and it hit off a St Johnstone defender’s arm

Donnelly said [Superscoreboard], “My argument is so that the one at the weekend, Maeda rattles one from point blank range off the boy’s arm and he can’t do anything about it.

“But that’s more a penalty than the Tomoki one at Tynecastle but if that hits your arm as the attacker and it goes in, it gets chalked off.

“I’m not saying the one at Celtic Park was a penalty but I’m just saying that it directly stopped the ball from going into the net.

“But if it was Maeda kicking it onto a teammate’s arm and the ball goes in, they will chalk it off. So it’s hugely frustrating.”

All credit to Donnelly for his honesty on this one. Whilst admitting he didn’t believe the St Johnstone handball warranted a penalty, comparing that decision to the ridiculous one we got against us at Tynecastle just highlights how inconsistent the rules are being applied.

And that is the biggest worry. You won’t find many Celtic fans agreeing that a penalty should have been awarded on Saturday.

However, if you asked the Celtic fans to compare that handball to Tomoki Iwata‘s then every fan would say a penalty should have been awarded.

The SFA really have got their work cut out for them and I also get the feeling that their new player liaison officer, Craig Beattie, is going to be working a lot of overtime between now and the end of the season.