Kemar Roofe Rangers goal response illustrates Brendan Rodgers Celtic VAR hypocrisy.
As Brendan Rodgers faces an SFA charge for comments made concerning VAR, the Celtic manager has clearly changed his tune from an early call v Rangers.
Way back in September last year, stuttering Celtic defender Gustaf Lagerbielke had his blushes spared by the refereeing technology when he was robbed by Rangers striker Cyriel Dessers.
The massive Nigerian attacker then found Kemar Roofe, who sent a raucous Ibrox delirious with the opening goal of the game until a VAR review led to the strike being ruled out.
It is a fairly amazing judgment in retrospect, with the Celtic defender attempting to catch the Rangers striker before collapsing after being beaten to the ball.
Brendan Rodgers defended VAR v Rangers
The moment was a pivotal one in the contest, with Celtic going on to win the game 1-0 and Rangers boos pouring out at now former manager Michael Beale.
Speaking after the game, Brendan Rodgers was a touch more tolerant towards the officials and not quite as apoplectic as he was following Celtic’s 2-0 defeat to Hearts.
“Rangers will probably say it was never a foul,” Rodgers told BBC Sport after the game. “I think obviously the referees, there’s enough officials looking at it and they obviously deemed it to be that.”
This is in stark contrast to the Celtic manager’s comments after VAR twice intervened v Hearts, leading first to Yang’s now upheld red card and then to a dubious Hearts handball penalty award.
Branding the referees “incompetent”, the Celtic manager played the old ‘for the benefit of the game’ card before stating football is now being refereed “off the pitch”.
Celtic boss going for seat amid Ibrox crowd?
Spare us the holier than thou rhetoric please, Brendan.
VAR must only be a significant concern when decisions go against Celtic but happily the footballing Gods have a way of evening these things out over a season.
That’s not to argue the referee was incorrect to award these rulings against Celtic, but where you explain a bone of contention in one regard but not in the other, it implies you really cannot be taken seriously.
That kind of one-sided bias is part of being a fan for sure but as for the managers, there’s a reason why Brendan Rodgers may be sitting in the stand when his side face Rangers next month.
That aforementioned footballing karma may well be in full action too, with the Celtic manager accused of “dog-whistling” to pro-Rangers conspiracies to divert from his own failures.
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