Michael Stewart and Neil McCann clash on BBC Sportscene over Rangers v Celtic controversy
Michael Stewart and Neil McCann have clashed over whether Celtic’s first goal against Rangers should have stood on Wednesday night.
Reo Hatate opened the scoring in the fifth minute after the ball fell to him at the edge of the box from a corner.
However, while defending the corner, Calvin Bassey was flattened by his teammate Joe Aribo and the Gers defender was left on the deck with a head injury.
Bobby Madden decided to award the goal despite looking as though he was about to blow his whistle when he noticed Bassey poleaxed on the ground.
Stewart feels it was the right decision to let play go on for Hatate to score.
“I think it perhaps could’ve been pulled up for a head knock but I think Bobby Madden calls this one right, personally,” said Stewart on BBC Sportscene on Wednesday night after the game [2 February].
“It’s a wonderful finish from Reo Hatate.
“You see here that Aribo collides with Bassey but when you see it from the reverse, there’s a potential that Bobby Madden pulls his whistle up to his mouth.
“From the reverse, I don’t think Bobby Madden really sees it as a head knock, he sees a collision between two players. It happened so quickly as well.”
McCann disagreed though and felt the game should’ve been stopped.
He said: “It’s this one here though, watch this and we’ll get a freeze on it. Bobby Madden looks at the player and now he’s only concerned for the player.
“That player’s lying out of the game, Bassey. And I think the referee has, first and foremost, got a responsibility to protect the players’ safety.
“I think Bassey looks totally sparko’d. And Bobby’s look at it, just before Hatate takes a touch to make the strike – it’s a beautiful strike, a great goal – he goes to blow [the whistle].
“He’s taking consideration there from the assistant but I think the play should’ve been stopped.
“Giovanni said after the game we must press it and do more with the seconds and he’s absolutely spot on. I think the player’s safety is paramount.”
Stewart then added: “I think there’s so little time. Look, it could’ve been pulled up and I don’t think there would have been a great deal of argument about it.
“But I do think that Bobby Madden has called it right because when he’s looking at that, he can’t see definitively that’s a head knock – that just looks like a collision between two players.”
McCann then butted in to say: “He’s not fallen down for a couple of seconds there, that’s the thing.”
Stewart finished the heated debate by saying: “The ball’s in the back of the net by that point.”
It’s a head injury
You can defend Madden all you like and say that he was right to award the goal. But at the end of the day, he allowed play to go on and allowed Celtic to score while Rangers had player on the ground with a head injury.
We haven’t really discussed this moment of controversy from the first half because ultimately, the game didn’t hinge on it.
Celtic were the better team and Rangers were awful. We deserved to lose by more than three goals, in all honesty.
But Madden got that totally wrong and he knew it.
Stewart is saying that he didn’t have enough time to decide it was a head injury and stop play. Well why did he put his whistle to his mouth, only to decide against whistling when he noticed Hatate was about to shoot?
Bassey was clearly shaken by the contact of Aribo and thankfully it wasn’t anything too serious and the Gers defender was able to continue playing.
But what it if was serious? What if the moments wasted by Madden were vitally important?
This cannot happen on a football pitch.
In other Rangers news, Tom English slammed this “punch-drunk” Gers player in the loss to Celtic.