As the dust settles on another Celtic win at Parkhead today, the main focal point was the performance of referee, Nick Walsh.
St Johnstone were unlucky to escape a red card after Chris Kane appeared to kick Celtic defender Cameron Carter-Vickers multiple times as he lay on the ground.
As Carter-Vickers retaliated, Kane also appeared to throw a punch at Vickers and instead of red carding the St Johnstone forward, Walsh incredibly decided a yellow was sufficient AFTER booking the Hoops defender for retaliation.
After that altercation, Walsh seemed to lose control of the match but did salvage a bit of pride by correctly awarding a penalty for a foul on Kyogo.
It was a truly mind boggling decision by the referee and one that BBC pundit, Michael Stewart, tried his best to explain, “There’s loads of bodies in the way and there’s a bit of a melee.
“Like so many other incidents, once the arms come up – whether it’s trying block somebody off or a push to get somebody away – as soon as you start coming round the chest it’s very easy to roll up and catch somebody in the face.
“But that was a classic incident where there’s been a melee, there’s two folk involved and the ref just comes over and, without much thought, gives out two yellows.
“You can break it down, look at it and go: ‘Well, that wasn’t deserved for one of them and it was deserved for the other’.
“It happens all the time.”
This was a really poor attempt at trying to excuse the a basic refereeing decision and it begs the question, “Is it open season on Celtic players?”
This article was originally posted here