SENTINELCELTS

Morning,all.

The fall out from the Old Firm game-and let’s not kid ourselves anymore,it was the Old Firm game-at the end of last month continues even yet. Last night,BADABING informed us that Derek Ferguson is still defending the throat-cutting gesture from Morelos. As this was on BBC Radio Scotland,I suggest that we all write to the Director General to ask if this is now official BBC policy,and can we expect such gestures to be permitted and defended on,say,Question Time or The Andrew Marr Show?

While you are doing so,ask if your letter can be treated as a job application-Tony Hall resigned yesterday,obviously anticipating this article!

Really,the BBC-even the sad sacs in Glasgow-should know better than to give credence to this suggestion. I could understand the better,more intelligent pundits like Stuart Cosgrove being allowed to rip apart the ongoing defence and cover up,but allowing neddish quarterwits like Ferguson and Rae air time to display their prejudices for all to see and hear,I’m sorry but that is not public broadcasting at anything like its best.

They are simply repeating a fairytale concocted by the utterly shameless and reprehensible Jim Traynor,and one which was ruthlessly exposed almost immediately for the lie that it was-by the Press in Morelos’ homeland! I’m sure that our native journalists are very pleased with themselves that they have now brought the reputation of their once-honourable profession to such a low that it is actually worse than that of a recent Banana Republic and Narco-State!

Think on that one,even if you struggle to digest your breakfast at the very thought of it.

Now,let’s roll this back a little bit. Let’s ask ourselves a simple question. How did we ever find ourselves in such a tangled web-Scotland,the country which even now provides the Laws of the Game to the rest of the world as part of IFAB,and has been instrumental in bringing the game into the modern world 160 years ago,and to many countries since.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Football_Association_Board

The obvious answer lies in who the wee thug plays for. Had he been playing for,say,Hearts while committing his offences over the last eighteen months,he would have been sine-died by now. Guaranteed,and good riddance too. But almost since the minute he walked through Customs Control after signing,he has been promoted and protected like the last surviving member of an endangered species. A Giant Dodo,or Great Oik spring to mind. More copy has been written telling us all of his greatness than there has been about Trump Xi and Johnston combined. His value has skyrocketed like that of a publicly-listed FAANG,while the truth is more akin to a dotcom bubble of twenty years ago.

But that’s what the press do,of course. They have always done things like that. Whether it be politics,music,sport,they will always promote their favourites. So we cannot pretend surprise here.

Where we DO have cause for complaint is with the officials,and with their own version of the kid glove cheerleader approach to him. From being ‘Just a little silly’ to full-on multiple assaults on our players amongst others. And all pretty much unpunished. Even to the extent that a referee stood in defence of him a year ago,saying that he had SEEN the attacks on Brown,Christie,Ralston. Not only did he see no reason to act on what he had seen,the fact that he didn’t was deemed to be enough in the eyes of the SFA.

You’re kidding me,right? Referee admits to seeing stuff but taking no action. SFA decide that means that no action can be taken against the player-and that no action can be taken against the referee either. Have you ever seen a bigger incentive for someone so minded to take advantage of A CHEAT’S CHARTER?

Well,how about this one? The latest in a long line,though unlikely to be the last,of course. The SFA have decided to cut out the middle man and do the facilitating themselves.

Wholesale cheating,if you will!

Morelos was sent off on the 29th,a second yellow card for diving when it would have been easier to score. On the way off the pitch he made his infamous throat-slitting gesture,one which could easily have led to a violent reaction from the fans in an already volatile atmosphere. The SFA Compliance Officer reviewed the match,and we alll know which was the only incident she deemed fit to cite for further punishment. I’ll leave the ins and outs of that decision for now,it is irrelevant to this article,except for the speed with which justice was dispensed in Ryan Christie’s case.

THREE BLOODY WEEKS later,and after much hunfuckwittery in the Press as they concocted increasingly surreal versions of events to defend the actions of Moreorlessaned,we finally got an explanation.

That Kevin Clancy had acted after the game,given him a third yellow card and that was it. Case closed.

We all waited for a statement on these events from Celtic,but none was forthcoming. Thankfully-their statements over the years have been a bigger pile of pish than we get served up to us in the papers.

No,the way to deal with this is not with a meaningless statement,it is by referring to the rule books. You may remember I mentioned IFAB above? Well,we start with The Laws of the Game. These are agreed by FIFA/UEFA and acted upon by the member federations and associations. Every year,IFAB issue an update on the laws and these are then passed down the line to be enacted at local level. So what are the relevant sections for dealing with Morelos?

He has already received a red card as a result of his second yellow,so from the SFA Judicial Panel Protocol,

Section 3-Sending-off Offences

“A5-Offensive,abusive or insulting language and/or gestures.”

Well,that means that if Clancy has seen enough to act,then the correct response is another card-but a RED one,not a craven yellow one. However,this was not reported at the time,nor even mentioned at all for a full three weeks.

How strange. How,in fact,unprecedented. Of course,we can all recall seeing players-Dean Windass,for example-receiving multiple red cards for afters on the way off the pitch. No yellow cards,craven or otherwise. Straight reds every time.

So the simple question is why the yellow when that punishment is not available under the SFA JPP,it’s own version of the laws handed down by FIFA and IFAB? Are the SFA complicit in breaching their own JPP and therefore The Laws of the Game?

Sure looks that way,and I don’t think FIFA would view such a cavalier approach too kindly. But wait-it gets worse. The days of multiple red cards are over,by FIFA/IFAB decree,and also included in the SFA JPP-which,remember,is its own wee handbook of the laws and how to apply them.

Section 2-Offences/Excessive Misconduct

1-Reporting of Offences by Match Officials.

“1.3 The referee shall also report offences by players,including details,where the referee cannot administer a caution or sending-off for the offence but otherwise would have done so(for example,the player has already been dismissed during the match). Such offences,and offences for which a caution or sending-off has been administered,shall all be treated as cautionable or sending-off offences as applicable in these Disciplinary Procedures.”

So,in other words,Clancy not only took the wrong course of action by dishing out a third yellow for a red card offence,he took the wrong course of action by handing out his form of summary justice at all. He was no longer in control of Disciplinary Procedures as he had already sent Morelos off.

His only possible course of action,having issued a red card then seen Morelos in breach of Section 3-A5 was as a witness to events,and to provide evidence to the SFA for further disciplinary action as appropriate to take its course.

Naturally,I believe Clancy has a very good defence against the suggestion that he acted inappropriately on the day. The very obvious one,in fact. That he did no such thing. This is known in Scotland as The Dougie Dougie Defence,and is one that usually only comes out in the wash after,ironically,an attempted whitewash and revision of events to suit a narrative.

But wait-surely he must have done it if the governing body and its own Compliance Officer,a qualified lawyer,say so. Why would they lie? Well,again let’s roll it back. Did Traynor act like a man who knew there was no case to answer when he was concocting his hallucinogenic fantasies about the meaning of a throat-slitting gesture in Colombia? Did Gerrard,when he was defending his player but pointing out that the club would still defend the player against additional charges? The Press,when they were repeating the narrative? Even the SFA’s own disciplinary website didn’t have any record of additional punishment!!!

This is not only a cover-up after the event,another example of protecting a thug who,believe me,is going to do someone a serious injury due to being indulged.

This. Is. A. Serious. Breach. Of. The. Laws. Of. The. Game.

This isn’t a referee interpreting a borderline case in the blink of an eye,the only time afforded him in the hustle and bustle of a match. This is a post-red card offence,where the referee is NOT EVEN ALLOWED TO TAKE ACTION other than to compile a report. And he didn’t-yet we are now being fed the blatant lie,despite all evidence to the contrary,that he did. Case closed.

Not so. The SFA have broken their own regulations,and in so doing have broken the regulations,The Laws of the Game,handed down to them from on high by FIFA/IFAB. That makes this no longer a local dispute,it makes it much more important than that.

They have moved into a whole new world of wholesale cheating,of rampant hunfuckwittery,of offering the huns a Get Out of Jail card and life-support machine all in one. They are now subverting The Laws of the Game. These are sacrosanct and not open to local interpretation.

This is why I said at the start that the usual mealy-mouthed statement from Celtic would not have sufficed,and that I was happy that none had even been attempted.

This is time for a complaint to FIFA itself. They need to be made aware that a local association is bringing them into disrepute,and with it,the game itself.

I refer you to the mail sent to the SFA by SOLKITTS of this parish,as posted on this site a few days ago. It reads-

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Sir,
As a retired referee who officiated in England, I was intrigued to read that a Rangers player, Alfredo Morelos, was cautioned for a 3rd time in a recent match versus Celtic, and that the 3rd yellow card was administered after Mr Morelos had been sent from the field of play.
Would you be so kind as to clarify the protocol which the match referee was following by punishing this further misconduct? As Mr Morelos had already been dismissed and therefore taking no further part in the game, was the correct protocol followed or should the misconduct have been reported separately in the referee’s match report?
I look forward to your early reply.

Kind regards,

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I suggest we all c&p it. Send it with a covering note saying that we saw this on social media and would like to know what response has been offered to it. Send it first to the SFA and to the already overworked Celtic SLO J-P Taylor.

And to FIFA.

Do it all on the same mail,all copied in. I’ve got a good idea whose desk at FIFA it will land on too,so if he ignores it we might get an extra body in this!

They’ve crossed the line,folks. Time to step it up.

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Above article by BMCUWP. Usaual rules if you want to stop rants like this-the only way to do it is by sending us articles to print instead. Mail it to Mahe

sentinelcelts@gmail.com