Craig Thomson irritated the Celtic support at Perth on Saturday with a couple of calls that got their backs up, with James Forrest booked for a relatively innocuous goal celebration and Leigh Griffiths booked for simulation when there appeared to be some contact from Richard Forster.

However, it was not just the Hoops fans who were unhappy with the whistler’s performance.

Thomson allowed a halftime interval of just 13 minutes and 45 seconds, while the rules state it should be 15 minutes. It meant that the teams came out while BT Sport were in a commercial before the first-half.

BT pundit Chris Sutton, the former Celtic striker, was enigmatic when he took to Twitter on Saturday night after the game when he was quizzed on the premature start to both halves, although the suspicion is that the whistler was exacting some revenge after last week’s comments from the former player towards Thomson’s performance at Dens Park last week.

Sutton had claimed that Thomson ‘bottled it’ by not sending off Rangers midfielder Harry Forrester.

Certainly, Sutton hinted at as much when he conversed via social media.

“It's unprecedented for refs to do this! Everything for a reason..” tweeted Sutton. “There must be a reason? Maybe good to ask Fleming and Thomson?

“The game goes round the world and normally refs play ball as far as I know but today Thomson ko d early...”