What a game for the neutral but for the Celtic fans, yesterday’s penalty kick thriller against Aberdeen was anything but.
Going behind to an early Bojan Miovski goal, two VAR checks for penalties against Celtic, two last-minute equalisers at the end of 90 minutes and extra time and then a penalty shoot-out where Joe Hart missed and saved one, made this Scottish Cup tie a game the Hoops supporters will remember as one of the most edgy and nervous they seen in a long time.
But there was one incident that really irked Aberdeen defender, Angus MacDonald, at Hampden yesterday and he couldn’t hold back speaking about it after the match.
MacDonald believes Scales was really lucky at Celtic
MacDonald was speaking about the handball incident involving Scales where VAR adjudged that the handball was not deserving of a penalty as it was committed outside the penalty area.
But the Aberdeen defender was still livid at full-time.
MacDonald said [The Sunday Post print edition page 68], “It was clearly a handball and I will be telling him that – although I’m sure he knows.
“I was surprised the linesman hadn’t seen it because from my perspective it was pretty
obvious.
“If it wasn’t in the box then fair enough but if it was, he’s got away with murder!”
At the time, I felt that even if the handball was committed inside the area, it would have been an extremely harsh decision if it was awarded.
But then, Celtic are no strangers to seeing this type of decision go against us. The most recent one was against Hearts where VAR changed the course of the game and led to Brendan Rodgers severely criticising John Beaton and the SFA officials which led to a touchline ban being dished out by the SFA.
In the end, the no-penalty decision was the correct one and it seems that on this occasion, VAR came to the correct decision and not affected the outcome of the game.