Why Hibs are allowed to postpone games due to Covid outbreak whilst Celtic weren’t

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It’s fair to say that the Celtic supporters weren’t overly-enamored with the SPFL for allowing Hibs to postpone their game against Ross County.

The Easter Road club have had to postpone their game against County at the weekend due to a Covid outbreak that’s rocked the Leith side. The game was rearranged for tonight, but Hibs have again had to postpone due to further positive cases.

Many Celtic fans were left bemused considering we had a similar situation last season that saw us demanded to play 2 games against Hibs and Livingston with a shadow squad. But the decision has been explained by STV journalist Jamie Borthwick, who said the following on Twitter:

Celtic were able to field a squad, albeit a shadow one, in January games against Hibs and Livingston. There were still several first-team players fit whilst academy graduates were given the chance to step up.

What appears to be the case here is that Hibs simply don’t have the numbers to do similar. Their own Covid outbreak has seemingly rocked them to the core. So much so that in terms of picking a matchday squad, Jack Ross has no options.

Forfeiting the game also isn’t an option. This has only ever been the case in the League Cup. League fixtures, meanwhile, have always been moved back to the next available date.

Celtic and Hibs situations do differ despite the disappointment

So these are, in fairness, 2 totally different situations. On one hand we have a club in Hibs that simply don’t have the talent pool to choose from that Celtic did.

There will be an argument that the Easter Road club should be using youngsters even younger than 18 to fill up their squads. However, it’s important that youth talent continues to be protected.

Sure it’s disappointing that we were effectively punished and forced to play the games just because we had a bigger pool. After all, we could certainly have used those games back in January being postponed until a later date. Who knows what 6 points in both could’ve done for our title hopes.

But it is what it is, and there’s no point reflecting back to last season. The decision has been made and you can understand the difference.

It’ll be interesting now to see how County respond to the postponements. It’s not something they’re likely to be overly-pleased with.

It was certainly a decision that angered some Celtic supporters on social media, with some of the following tweets questioning the decision:

In other news, Exclusive: Scott McDonald on “ridiculous” Scotland omission for Celtic star Anthony Ralston