Celtic’s dramatic late win over Ross County in the Scottish Premiership hit the headlines for two reasons this afternoon.
Nicolas Kuhn’s 87th-minute Celtic winner against Ross County meant that Brendan Rodgers kept his unbeaten start to the league season intact.
The Celtic boss will be delighted that he now goes into the international break still top of the Scottish Premiership table after it looked like precious away points could have been dropped in Dingwall.
But the second reason is that a storm was brewing online as to why the Hoops winger was not given a second yellow card for his goal celebration that sealed Celtic’s win over Ross County.
IFAB’s Law 12 of ‘Celebration of a goal’ in full
Match referee, Kevin Clancy could potentially have sent off Nicolas Kuhn after he did this after netting the goal that sunk Don Cowie’s Ross County at Dingwall:
According to the IFAB rules, Law 12 of ‘Celebration of a goal’ is explained in full as follows. The law states:
“Players can celebrate when a goal is scored, but the celebration must not be excessive; choreographed celebrations are not encouraged and must not cause excessive time-wasting.
“Leaving the field of play to celebrate a goal is not a cautionable offence but players should return as soon as possible.
“A player must be cautioned, even if the goal is disallowed, for:
- climbing onto a perimeter fence and/or approaching the spectators in a manner which causes safety and/or security issues
- acting in a provocative, derisory or inflammatory way
- covering the head or face with a mask or other similar item
- removing the shirt or covering the head with the shirt
So had Clancy brandished that second yellow and therefore sent Kuhn for an early bath, the Celtic camp could have no complaints, right?
Wrong. That’s according to The Behind the Whistle’s social media account who explained exactly why Kuhn remained on the field of play.
Celebrating with fans ‘no longer an automatic yellow’
The account which is run by former SFA referees Des Roach and Steve Conroy also referred to the IFAB Law listed above but expanded further on why Kuhn stayed on the pitch.
The Behind the Whislte’s podcast tweeted on X, “Under the current wording, It’s no longer an automatic yellow card and the current wording is rather ambiguous.
“Referee’s considerations on this one is it excessive causing time-wasting and did it cause safety concerns or a security issue.
“For us, there wasn’t an indication of time wasting as Kevin Clancy appeared to only wave them back once and didn’t approach them to get them back on the park.
“However, the big question is whether going to the crowd breaches that Safety/security wording. Appreciating the passion of a player who believes he’s just won a game. He’s lucky as being on a yellow he could have walked if Kevin Clancy took a stern line.”
The online storm that has preceded Kuhn’s goal regarding this matter has just shown how much fans are annoyed that a) Celtic won the game and b) How the game’s rules still need clarification in certain areas.
For Celtic and the fans they will not care one bit about this as they will be happy to end a miserable week on a high heading into the international break with the lead at the top of the table still intact.
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