Celtic’s loss to Hearts this afternoon will be spoken about for all the wrong reasons in the coming week.
The VAR controversy surrounding the result was brought to the fore by Brendan Rodgers as he urged the Sky Sports post-match journalist to ask John Beaton about the decisions that cost Celtic three vital title points.
However, it seems that the Celtic manager is not alone in his views about today’s match officials. Lawrence Shankland and Steven Naismith were both asked about the decision to award Hearts a penalty and the ordering off of Hyunjun Yang and both gave a really honest assessment of both key decisions.
Shankland said [Sky Sports], “You never really know to be honest. The game obviously stopped at different times and the two incidents were obviously the red card and the penalty.
“I thought it was pretty harsh honest but I have not seen the contact to that. So that’s me commenting from afar.
“But you take it and ride your luck when the decisions go for you.”
Hearts manager, Steven Naismith also admits his team were lucky with the VAR decisions that went for his team this afternoon.
The Tynecastle boss said, “The Celtic penalty I think was soft as well. I know the referees have got a tough decision because of the handball but the rule is poor so we were fortunate to get that one as well.”
VAR causes Celtic controversy
Not for the first time has VAR caused controversy in a game involving Celtic. The video referee has cost the club three vital points in the race for the title and you can’t bet against it being heavily involved in the remaining nine games of the season.
VAR is meant to reduce the amount of decisions referees get wrong but, so far, it seems that the ones like today that really matter, are still being assessed wrongly.
Will this game cost Celtic in the long term this season? I think it’s fair to say it could. As the games tick down Brendan Rodgers is still chasing Rangers in these closing stages when it could have all so different had the match officials just come to the correct decisions.
However, you could also argue that if Adam Idah sticks his penalty away then the outcome of the match could have been very different.
But there is no denying that VAR has affected the outcome of this game when it was in the balance with just 16 minutes gone.
In other news, Neil Lennon shuts down Kris Boyd with Celtic VAR red card verdict
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