“(Ibrox) vindicated and Celtic told they’re wrong again as KMI panel weighs in on red cards that were and weren’t,” screams the headline.
Good God. That would be puerile and dripping with bias if it had appeared on one of the pitiful fan sites across the city. But this ran in a national newspaper. You get no prizes for guessing which one.
Even if the story it’s trying to tell had any credibility, which it does not, that gleeful, mocking, condescending tone would still be completely unnecessary. It is unprofessional. The fact that it appears in a national title shows the level of contempt they have for our supporters and for any reader who does not share their pro-Ibrox slant.
The story itself concerns yesterday’s KMI panel decisions.
And once again, what can you even say?
We are expected to treat this as some kind of independent, professional body. A panel of people who understand the rules and know what they are doing. In reality, the entire exercise lacks credibility as Dundee Utd pointed out last year. Even the SFA acknowledges that the panel carries no formal authority.
There is not a single person in this country who should take its verdicts seriously.
The governing body itself admits that the group consists of lay members. Former players. Media figures. Others with no formal officiating background. Yes, former referees sit on the panel, but the entire process happens behind closed doors.
There is no transparency. There is no accountability.
That secrecy alone undermines any legitimacy the panel claims to have. For all we know Hugh Dallas sits on it. For all we know they have the Village Idiot and Bill Leckie there as well. That’s the thing; we don’t know and we’re not going to. How are we supposed to respond to these calls when we can’t evaluate the motivations behind them?
Meanwhile, genuinely respected former referees have looked at the Trusty decision and described it as a scandal. I’ll take their word for it. They have no vested interest. No audience to play to. No club agenda.
Unlike certain newspapers, which know exactly who they are writing for.
But even then, what difference does any of this make now? What blow do they imagine has been struck against Celtic?
The SFA has already rejected the appeal. The player is already suspended. The damage was done the moment the original decision stood. Arguably, the incident itself cost us points. The failed appeal has cost us the player for three matches.
A group of anonymous panel members offering their opinion after the fact changes nothing. That headline, and the article that follows it, exists for one reason only. To gloat. It is petty and small. It is not journalism by any realistic definition.
All this amounts to is cheap point-scoring.
Nobody at Celtic Park was lying awake at night waiting for vindication from the KMI panel. Even if the verdict had gone the other way, it would have achieved nothing. Anyone who has followed previous KMI outcomes knows exactly how little weight they carry.
The entire debate around these decisions now operates on a false premise. Everyone knows what the situation is. Everyone knows how these processes work. And everyone knows something else. We have more of this to come.
Beaton and McLean are already confirmed as the officiating team for Sunday’s game. Compared to that reality, the KMI panel barely registers as an irritation.
Which is why this story is not really about the panel at all.
It is about the sneering tone of the newspaper that chose to frame it this way.
The piece comes from the so-called Assistant Live Sports Editor. Job titles like that always remind me of American Psycho, where everyone in Patrick Bateman’s office seems to be a vice president. Titles designed to suggest importance without actually conferring any. To pretend these people have responsibilities when they have none.
It sounds far more impressive than what the title really represents in this case. Professional cut-and-paste work. And a bit of trolling.
Because that is all this article amounts to.
Celtic have suffered no new setback. No fresh damage. No additional harm. A group of individuals with no authority reaches a conclusion that favours Ibrox and goes against Celtic. That is not news. That is dog bites man in the Glasgow rain.
The paper could have reported it neutrally. It could have framed it as what it actually was, a retrospective opinion exercise with no practical consequence. Instead, it chose the inflammatory headline. Because that is all that paper has left.
Provocation.
It is the last refuge of a publication that no longer informs and instead tries to provoke a reaction.
The last refuge of the journalistic scoundrel.
That tells you far more about them than anything a KMI panel could ever say about Celtic.
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