“Where do you draw the line?” Willie Collum on the elephant in the room in Scottish football

The Celtic Star

·12 September 2024

“Where do you draw the line?” Willie Collum on the elephant in the room in Scottish football

Willie Collum followed up his VAR Review video which was posted on YouTube yesterday afternoon with an appearance on Clyde 1 Superscoreboard last night. There he addressed the integrity issue of Scottish match officials and their own personal allegiances to certain clubs…

Match official Willie Collum arrives at the stadium prior to the Scottish Premiership match between Celtic and theRangers at Celtic Park on May 11, 2024. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Collum, frankly because of his religion, has been accused of bias towards Celtic by Rangers supporters over the years but there is little or no evidence of that or of any favourable decision shown towards Celtic during his career. Remember Collum once gave Rangers a penalty at Celtic Park when he had his back turned on the incident, claiming he’d heard the non existent contact. He has had similar decisions affecting every club but only one sent a long letter of complaint to the Scottish FA about him demanding that he wasn’t allowed to referee any of their games and pretty much got what they wanted.

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Didn’t he have to wait to a dead rubber game at the end of that season before taking one of their games? Then he got a low profile cup tie at Ibrox against Ayr United? That was just about that before his whistle was hung up.

Collum does make a decent point about referees needing to be recruited from across Scotland regardless of the team that they supported but it would be more valid if there was not such a weight of evidence showing bias is there in the Scottish game, in favour of one club and it is clearly not Celtic.

Fabio Silva dives inside the Celtic penalty area and cons a penalty from Alistair Johnston, referee John Beaton initially booked Silva for simulation but reversed the yellow card and awarded theRangers a penalty kick after a VAR sent an edited clip for review. Photo Stuart Wallace/Shutterstock

The phrase ‘Penalty to Rangers’ is widely used in Scottish football. Has there been a club receiving more penalties than them over the time Collum was a referee? And of course at the other end of the park they went on this long ‘world record’ run of games without conceding a spot kick at the other end. There’s even a racehorse called Penalty to Rangers!

And when a controversial decision does go against them theRangers get their notebook out a pen a long letter of complaint to the Scottish FA to achieve their desired outcome. Like the time Clancy let Aberdeen take a spot kick that was awarded, with the ball moving slightly just ahead of contact. The letter of complaint was posted pretty soon after their team bus got back from Pittodrie.

Football – 2023 / 2024 Scottish Premiership – Glasgow theRangers vs Heart of Midlothian – Ibrox stadium – 29th October 2023 James Tavernier of Rangers scores a penalty

Of course Clancy’s own faith may well have been a factor and this has been something that Walter Smith once referred to regarding a linesman who once got a call wrong, in the then Rangers manager’s view.

These incidents indicate something that Collum doesn’t address. Let’s assume that the decisions were all incorrect, let’s also assume that all three match officials have one thing in common which has nothing to do with football. The well is poisoned.

But by piling on this pressure the outcome is that the match officials end up sharing certain characteristics more agreeable to the complainers. And that is why Scottish football fans – not just Celtic supporters – see this as a corrupt outcome so often.

Yet Willie Collum reckons that it is “insulting” to suggest certain referees are biased towards Rangers or even Celtic (no laughing at the back).

Speaking last night on Clyde Superscoreboard, the Head of Referees said: “I think it is insulting because it is questioning people’s integrity. Referees integrity is alway at the utmost. What I would say as well is people say geographically a referee comes from here, or comes from there and has a background as I mentioned earlier – I don’t care about any of these things. I want quality, and that is what we judge referees on.

“First off all, referees need to declare an interest. We had a top assistant a couple of years ago and his son was playing for a senior club, even though he was playing for an under-19 club he declared that as an interest. Also, if somebody is working for a company that sponsors a particular club, these are the things we would expect the referee to declare an interest in.

“In terms of a team that somebody might support or a connection with a family member, where do we draw the line? We want to encourage people into refereeing and say you can referee the top games – you can referee the top games. We would put a blocker on that, and I keep saying where do you draw the line?

“If somebody’s third relative had a connection somewhere, or had a season ticket to support somebody – what I would say is, and I want to be really honest with people, when you are refereeing at the top level of the game you have a passion for it, you want to achieve well. Refereeing took me places as a young kid that I never dreamed I would go to. Why would I jeopardise or risk that to say ‘I want this team to win or affect this’ – I want people to trust me that it’s not the case.

“We are barraged by comments in the west of Scotland towards one club or the other – that is not the case. People make genuine decisions, genuine errors and we are honest.

“If referees weren’t honest we would have a problem. It’s 2024, I think we need to move away from that. I would ask people to shift that narrative, let’s get behind referees rather than try to pick a fault because a person is associated with that or that. They are top referees for a reason and it’s been a long journey to get there. And when they get there they want to stay there.”

Here’s Willie Collum discussing whether referees should declare which team they support during his appearance on Clyde 1 Superscoreboard last night. Please add your own comment below…

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