STEPHEN McGOWAN: SFA have to let clubs see that punishment fits the crime for incompetent refs

Rangers have written to the SFA expressing their serious concerns about the level of VAR decision-making in the Premier Sports Cup final.

The governing body should write back straight away and want to know what action the Ibrox club plans to take to prevent Philippe Clement losing to Celtic on January 2. How they want to stop Jack Butland giving away stupid penalties against St Mirren. Or to clarify why Dujon Sterling lost the ball in the third minute of extra time for the Saints winner.

Football is a game full of human error. One in which clubs unwilling to dwell on their own shortcomings rarely miss an opportunity to highlight the shortcomings of VAR to get angry fans off their backs.

While Rangers will likely have to resolve their issues with the governing body privately, their latest Christmas statement raises a difficult question for football authorities in Scotland and elsewhere.

If the men who paid to find clear and obvious mistakes make a clear and obvious mistake themselves, how should they be punished?

Nobody with half a brain Real thinks that civil servants deliberately make wrong decisions. That said, Rangers fans would still Alan Muir, Frank Connor and the overlooked Andrew Dallas march through the streets, handcuffed and wearing crowns of thorns.

While the public shaming may not improve the standard of decision-making, it would make supporters feel better about a penalty review at Hampden that chief of referees Willie Collum called ‘unacceptable’.

In the quest for ‘accountability’, the erring referees were kept off the schedule for at most a match or two. And the Ibrox club thinks that is not nearly enough.

The problem here is that no one has ever really thought about what punishment would be enough. Or what accountability actually means in this context.

When a centre-back is shown a red card for depriving a team of an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, he or she is given an automatic one-match ban. Punishing officials more severely because they have the same impact on a game seems overly harsh.

Nobody Real of course knows how they will be punished. And that’s a big part of the problem.

If players do something wrong, everyone knows what suspension they will face.

One violation earns them a yellow card and a warning. Two – or a serious foul – is a red card and an automatic one-match suspension. If you collect too many yellow or red cards, they will have to remain in the stands for a longer period of time.

Referees might tell you that the assessment, training and grading they receive behind closed doors is worse than Fergie’s. To the outside world it seems like a slap on the wrist and back to work the next day.

Just as a club manager can’t skin his own player in public, Willie Collum won’t make things better if he makes a habit of throwing a small group of elite officials under a bus.

Nor will he raise standards much if he turns a blind eye to their incompetence. The trick here is to make the punishment fit the crime and leave clubs out to see that it happens.

Alan Muir made a big mistake in a match between Motherwell and Celtic earlier this season when he failed to score a penalty for Daizen Maeda. Instead of being hammered, he was given control of the VAR scoreline for the first major cup final of the season.

Another full-time VAR official, Greg Aitken, failed to take three penalties in nine minutes in the match between Ross County and St Mirren. His punishment for that is a ringside seat at Clydesdale House for Sunday’s match between Dundee United and Aberdeen.

Muir, meanwhile, is back with his finger on the red button for St Mirren v Dundee, while assistant VAR Connor will lead the line for Celtic v St Johnstone.

According to their statement, Rangers have a problem with Connor returning to take charge of ‘a match involving the club that took advantage of the mistake’ at Hampden.

Unless they suggest that bias somehow influenced his decision – a serious accusation – the question of where he is plying his trade this weekend is irrelevant.

The only question anyone should ask is whether the Hampden Three did that too Real served their time? And if the SFA believes the punishment is proportionate and fair, they should not hesitate to write directly back to Rangers urging them to put their own house in order before handing out board lectures to anyone else.

Dons is still reeling from Rocky’s telling blow

It barely feels like five minutes since David Gray was a dead man and Jimmy Thelin was the dick of the North.

Late last month, Hibs slipped to an inept 4-1 defeat by Dundee, making it one win in thirteen league games.

On the same day, Aberdeen suffered their first defeat in 21 games when they were defeated at St Mirren. With eight points ahead of Rangers in second place, there was no need to panic.

The Dons should have returned to a winning groove at Easter Road three days later. Ester Sokler’s 3-2 goal in the 95th minute should have put the final nail in Gray’s coffin. When Rocky Bushiri showed up with an unlikely last gasp, Hibs had their sliding doors moment.

They have won four of five since then, their only defeat coming against Celtic which left them asking serious questions. From rock bottom they have risen to seventh place, buoyed by the likes of Nicky Cadden who emerged as a solid seven out of ten performers. No one is fixating on Gray’s future these days.

For Aberdeen, Bushiri’s late goal at Easter Road had the opposite effect. It killed them.

In the five games since then, Thelin’s team has lost three and drawn two. Any semblance of a title challenge is gone. An abysmal 4-0 defeat to Kilmarnock was their worst performance of the season and Rangers have moved back into second place, where they will surely remain.

The Dons have fallen off a cliff, while Hibs have pulled back from the brink with a thumping win over arch-rivals Hearts.

Who saw that coming four weeks ago?

Budge doesn’t need this boo boy stuff

The Edinburgh derby was a day to quickly forget for parts of the Hearts support.

Allegations of racist abuse against Hibs player Jordan Obita are the subject of a police investigation.

Continued personal abuse directed at majority shareholder Ann Budge is now an act of monstrous ingratitude.

The boo boys seem to forget that, without Budge’s intervention, they would have no club to support – let alone an owner to shout out.

Now that her loan has been repaid, there is no longer any reason for a 76-year-old woman to tolerate this nonsense. She doesn’t need the effort.

January will see a new data collaboration with Jamestown Analytics, Brighton owner Tony Bloom.

And if it is the gamechanger Hearts expect, Budge will sail into the sunset with the legacy her contribution deserves.