Celtic secured their 53rd Scottish Premiership title on Sunday afternoon courtesy of a 2-0 win at Tynecastle over Hearts.
Ange Postecoglou made it back to back league triumphs for himself in Glasgow with the victory that put testament to his claims that the Hoops would come back ‘bigger’ and ‘better’ for 2022/23.
In the match itself that ensured league glory, Celtic didn’t start in the greatest manner yet improved as it went on, second half strikes from Kyogo and Oh securing the points.
In the first half, though, there was a bit of controversy over a red card that was given to Hearts defender Alex Cochrane.
Daizen Maeda was played in behind and the 23 year old appeared to have impeded the mercurial forward as he was in on goal.
Nick Walsh gave an initial yellow but following a VAR review, upped his decision to a red card.
This was a move which surprised Hearts captain Lawrence Shankland (Glasgow Times):
“I was surprised it got checked initially, I thought he would maybe have checked it and stuck with his decision.”
If you watched the game, you will know this was not the case.
Rather, Walsh got rid of the caution and showed red to Cochrane, something Shankland was content with:
“When I went to speak to the referee he said there was no defender there covering. I took his word for it at the time.”
The decision that was made here was a greatly accurate and correct one.
VAR was used to great effect in this situation because a clear, goalscoring opportunity was denied.
Let’s hope we see more of these correct calls in the future.
