Two weeks on and the discussion over two Hampden flashpoints in Celtic’s win over St Johnstone continues.
67 Hail Hail discussed how match referee Callum Scott spoke about Celtic striker Adam Idah after the foul on him made VAR disallow St Johnstone’s second half goal at Hampden.
After initially saying Idah was ‘looking for it all day [the foul]’ VAR forced Scott to change his initial verdict and correctly rule the goal out.
And now, to the next big decision. James Forrest’s disallowed Celtic penalty. The Celtic winger looked like he has been tripped and had a forearm smash across his face.
Scott awarded Celtic a spot kick but VAR ruled the decision as incorrect. Here’s why.
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The challenge VAR used to disallow Celtic’s penalty vs St Johnstone
In the SFA’s monthly The VAR Review show, Head of Referees Willie Collum explains how his match officials come the the decisions they do and explains why the decision where correct or wrong.
And here, speaking about Forrest’s penalty award, VAR explains why they made the match referee change his original decision about the spot kick.
Scott: “The first one is a block across and he doesn’t play the ball. It’s the first challenge Andy [Andrew Dallas on VAR].”
Dallas: “Okay, checking on field decision of penalty. So Alan [Muir AVAR], he’s talking about this challenge coming across here.
“For me, I don’t think it’s a penalty kick. So that is outside and that there, he takes another step then goes down. I don’t think it’s a penalty kick.”
Willie Collum’s verdict on VAR decision to disallow Celtic’s Hampden penalty
The first challenge where Forrest appears to have been tripped was used as the yardstick to make the VAR call. But what about the forearm across the Celtic legend’s face? Collum explains.
Collum said, “There’s an initial challenge outside the box but then as they they come inside the first challenge is what the referee awards a penalty for and the VAR immediately has to go into a check there.
“I have to say I was watching the footage live in the VAR centre and for me, it looked like a penalty kick. But when you start to analyse it, the challenge the referee’s punished, there’s no contact or minimal contact.
“I actually don’t think there’s any and then the Celtic player goes down. There has been talk about an arm coming across, that’s not enough in terms of a threshold for us to award a penalty kick here.”
Whilst VAR continues to make headlines in Scotland, The VAR Review show at least delivers clarity when there is sometimes dubiety.
As the decisions had no bearing on the match result, the controversy surrounding them was minimal. However, what this game proves is that referees still have a bit of work to do to get on-field decisions correct at the first call.
But at least VAR, finally, appears to be doing it’s job properly.
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