SO, who was your man of the match at Celtic Park?
David Bates was awarded that accolade by Sky, a decision which infuriated his Rangers team-mate James Tavernier who loudly castigated the young defender, with tongue in cheek, while the hero of the hour was being interviewed by the club’s own media people. Danny Wilson would have been with a shout as well.
For Celtic, Scott Brown was their best outfield player while Craig Gordon made two outstanding saves, which were the most important contributions in the game.
However, the best performance came from the man in the middle, Bobby Madden, who demonstrated perfectly how to referee this chaotic fixture.
Now, most people would have missed a blog from last week that made serious allegations towards Madden which I won’t repeat because they are unfounded and actionable.
What I will say is that it called into question the man’s integrity, stopping just short of outright calling him a cheat, and the usual faceless basement-dwellers jumped on the bandwagon because when you hide behind a false name there is less of a chance of being sued.
They ought to be ashamed of themselves but I’m sure it got a lot of clicks which is, of course, more important than a fellow human’s reputation.
How disappointed they must have felt when Madden booked two Rangers players early on and then went on to have a fine match in which he got all the major decisions right, allowed the game to flow as best he could and didn’t feel the need to blow his whistle every time a tackle was put in.
In fact, you could argue he was ever-so-slightly more lenient towards Celtic but, in truth, he was fair for both teams which is all any sane football supporter wants.
There are those out there who believe the world is out to get Celtic be it the Press, referees, the SFA and probably the CIA. What a waste of a life it is to spend your time on such nonsense when the team you support is actually doing so well that they are making history.
From a Celtic perspective, they didn’t win because too many key players were off their game and too many good chances were not taken. That’s it. Nothing more or less.
And, yet, according to some Madden denied Celtic (and Rangers it has to be said because their fans were at it as well) with decisions they saw but nobody else did.
Some of the pre-match comments about the man were disgusting and made by people with clearly little else going on. Although it was interesting to note just how many fans on both sides actually praised the referee, some more grudgingly than others, which tells you how well he actually did.
Players like Madden’s approach. He is old school and not one to go by the rulebook all of the time. He is a good communicator and by and large they know where they stand with him.
This was his first Celtic-Rangers game since the match at Parkhead last season when he didn’t have a good game and I wrote as much.
Rangers did well to finish the game with ten men and Leigh Griffiths should have been awarded a penalty at the end, Clint Hill would have been sent off as well, and nothing is going to convince me otherwise.
I was told that Madden, who I have never spoken to, believed it to be personal which was not my intention at all. In this business, there are times when you are going to upset someone and this was one such occasion.
However, credit where it’s due and a lot should go to the worst paid professional on the pitch on Saturday who, and isn’t this the way of it, has the most difficult job. I await the blog in which someone admits they were wrong and Madden had a good day. I'm in for a long wait.
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