Cast your minds back to last week’s Dundee derby.
In particular, Paul McGowan’s winning goal and the subsequent celebration. I mentioned it in my last post.
Without wishing to cover old ground, imagine this situation: Scott Brown scores the winner in an Old Firm game at Celtic Park. He runs straight towards the Rangers fans, cupping his hand behind his ears with occasional, more provocative gesturing. He’d be up on a police charge pretty quickly, you would imagine. At the very least, there’d be enough righteous indignation from all quarters to power a small country.
He wouldn’t be booked, obviously, because he is Scott Brown. He’s so well protected by Scottish referees that he doesn’t even get booked in hypothetical examples that exist only within my own head.
I’m not suggesting Paul McGowan should be on a police charge (as I don’t think for a nanosecond he should be), although I imagine that would be an experience which is not new to him. As far as I know, while there was a lot of rage about what McGowan did, no-one saw fit to report him to the police, although I am willing to stand corrected on that.
So anyway. Neil Lennon went to Ibrox on Saturday and a minor storm was created.
Before I go on, in the interests of full disclosure, I do not like Neil Lennon.
I think my dislike dates back to the famous Dougie MacDonald game all the way back in 2010.
To break it down, MacDonald gave Celtic a penalty in a game at Tannadice in October 2010, which was the wrong decision. He wandered over to his linesman, telling him “I think I’ve fucked up”, which, to be fair, he had, so he reversed the decision.
He was correct to reverse the decision, as it was not a penalty, as Dusan Pernis played the ball about three days before he played Gary Hooper. I restate this fact as it often gets lost, like a diamond in a sea of raw sewage.
MacDonald lied about the reason why he didn’t give the penalty, as subsequent events proved. His story was that the linesman overruled the decision, and he told Lennon as much afterwards. In actual fact, he had realised he had given the wrong decision and reversed it, but for whatever reason didn’t have the balls to admit that afterwards.
But Neil Lennon’s post-match comments, bearing in mind this was a game Celtic won anyway, were pretty telling about the whole affair, and gives you an insight into his mindset.
“He’s given the penalty and for me he can’t change his mind. I didn’t get an explanation until the referee came over and spoke to me. His explanation was that his linesman had a better view of it and the keeper had played the ball. I find that unacceptable. He looked adamant to me when he gave the penalty. He got a good look at it. Looking at the replay Pernis has got a touch on the ball but he has taken Gary as well. There was a long, long delay between him awarding the penalty and him allowing the bounce ball. It was a very strange decision and we could have got a couple of other penalties as well. But I suppose you have to put it down to another honest mistake by the referee.”
It’s important to bear in mind that these comments were made before he knew that he had been lied to. So, referees are not allowed to change their mind. Even if they think they were wrong in the first place. Not when it affects poor wee put-upon Neil, anyway.
I find it interesting and also quite telling that he insinuates that referees are biased against him with his “honest mistake” remark, even though the referee instinctively gave Celtic the decision, wrongly. Och well.
The irony of the whole situation is that MacDonald would not have had to resign had he just stuck to the original incorrect decision and awarded the penalty. But as only Dundee United would have lost out in that scenario, it wouldn’t really have mattered to anyone.
Anyway. I don’t like him. But, I can say the same about a lot of managers. If the sight of any of these managers whipped me up into that much of a frenzy, I’d probably be too angry to ever leave the house.
Now, for some reason, and I cannot imagine why, Rangers fans seem to find the mere presence of Neil Lennon almost intolerably provocative.
There was a lot of ho-ho-ho on Sportsound about this on Saturday before Rangers played Hibs, as (I think) Chick Young commented that “Neil Lennon is sure of a hot reception”, and having a good chuckle about it, without ever really saying why.
Bigotry is hilarious, isn’t it?
I cannot imagine what it’s like hearing 50,000 bigots shout the most horrific sectarian abuse at you. It’s not a new experience for Lennon, but I wouldn’t have thought that this would make it any easier to deal with. In Lennon’s defence, had I been in his shoes on Saturday I’d have probably run round Ibrox with my trousers down shouting expletives in all directions.
I have reacted to Simon Murray goals in less dignified ways than that in my time, believe me.
With all this in mind, judging Neil Lennon’s actions on Saturday is quite difficult. Walk a mile in his shoes, and so on.
Despite that, cupping your ears in the direction of the home fans, and giving the internationally recognised gesture meaning get it right fucking up you, as funny as it was, probably wasn’t clever.
But it was all rather pantomime. Certainly a long way short of the sheer malevolence the man can display on occasion, as shown by his comments I quoted earlier. And frankly, if that type of thing angers you to such an extent, you shouldn’t be anywhere near a football ground.
I do enjoy the irony of fans who shout the most horrible abuse at players and managers but run crying to the police when some of it is given back. You hear the chanting and singing at the vast majority of Rangers games, and you wonder why, of all the things they see and hear each week, the sight of Neil Lennon cupping his ears is the thing that offends them.
“I can’t believe we’re not allowed to sing the Famine Song. We can’t even chant Fuck The Pope any more without The Man getting on our backs. These people are so sensitive, they really need to toughen up, bloody snowflakes…wait, hang on, the opposition manager cupped his ears in my general direction! OFFICER! THAT MAN OFFENDED ME! HE COULD HAVE STARTED A RIOT BECAUSE I CANNOT HANDLE SUCH AN OVERT DISPLAY OF IRISH CATHOLICISM PROVOCATION”.
I mean, we all have things we get offended by, but the vast majority of football fans, of all colours, tend to look like hypocrites fairly quickly when the he-said-she-said starts.
Now, this is where I step aside and comment that there are two different things going on. In the rather binary world of Scottish football, it maybe isn’t possible to say this, but here goes. You can argue that Neil Lennon acted like a bit of a cock on Saturday, but maybe, just maybe, this doesn’t mean he deserves the treatment that he receives.
It’s not complicated, really. Saying that a manager behaved rather twattishly doesn’t mean you are justifying the reaction towards him, or that he somehow “brings it on himself”. It doesn’t work, and frankly to suggest as such is something of a cop-out, as if football fans are all automatons who cannot be held responsible for their own behaviour.
If you need a laugh, and in this day and age I think we all do, the Club 1872 statement is a thing of wonder, and not just because Club 1872 sounds like a truly appalling holiday company.
“I went on a Club 1872 holiday last month”
“Really, where did you go?”
“The 17th century”
Ba-dum, and indeed, tish.
I don’t wish to analyse that display of outraged fist-typing from Club 1872 any more than it already has been, because plenty of people have done that better than I could. All I would say, is that for a serious statement, it reads like the most perfectly pitched piece of parody I have read in many a year. I’m only surprised that the laptop belonging to whoever wrote it didn’t blow up under the sheer weight of the salty tears of seethe landing on it.
If someone had written that statement as a parody of idiotic football supporters, it would have been such a good one they probably would have deserved a Pulitzer.
This wasn’t the worst overreaction to events, of course.
You have to marvel at the mind of someone who, on seeing Lennon’s gesturing, feels that the best way to react is by going onto a social network to write death threats.
Leaving aside the abhorrent morality of such a reaction, as if a reaction like that is in any way proportionate to what Lennon may or may not have done, to do something like that is utterly stupid. It’s almost as if people still think, despite all evidence to the contrary, you have some sort of immunity when posting online, like the laws somehow don’t apply to you, or you won’t get caught. Bollocks.
People this stupid don’t deserve computers. Or football. Or anything, really.
Nothing will change as a result of this. Lennon may or may not get sanctioned by the SFA, Rangers fans will continue to be bigoted towards him and he will probably continue to wind them up, mostly down to his mere existence.
Meanwhile, a fanbase who spend their most recent game live on TV singing so many IRA songs that the host broadcaster decided to mute them will claim the moral high ground, and the whataboutery will continue, and absolutely nothing will get done. We’ll keep getting told about the “Scottish football problem”, even though only 2 out of the 42 Scottish league clubs seem to be afflicted by it.
Round like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel, never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel.
It’s enough to make you wish for the nuclear war that Donald Trump and Kim Jong-Un seem determined to have. I can’t help thinking we have failed as a species.
sarto mutiny 