There were two major incidents in Celtic’s 2-1 victory over Motherwell at Paradise this afternoon that referee John Beaton, and his linesmen, got horribly wrong today.
Two ‘honest mistakes’ if you like.
The first one. A clear hand ball by the Motherwell player in the box where Abada crosses the ball and the Motherwell player sticks his hand up to his face to block it,
As clear a hand ball and penalty as you will ever see.
But John Beaton and his linesman looking right at the incident just yards away don’t give it.
His hand wasn’t in a natural position at his side, he literally stuck it up in the air near his face to stop the ball from hitting him. It was a shocking decision.
And then towards the end of the game Celtic are reduced to ten men after captain Callum McGregor is sent off.
It was a professional foul but Stephen Welsh was covering and therefore it was not a clear and obvious goal scoring opportunity which it needs to be to be a red card. But despite Beaton and the linesman seeing Welsh back covering, he decided to still send off McGregor and reduce Celtic to ten men for the last five minutes of injury time.
Ange even said himself in his post match interview that we had a man back covering, so hopefully this is one that Celtic will look to appeal, because it’s clear that a red card was wrongly given in this instance.
Take a look at the two shocking decisions below.