Celtic supporters have spent much of Sunday trying to work out how Camilo Duran’s goal at St Mirren was ruled out. Now former top-flight referee Mark Clattenburg has now had his say, and he believes the officials should be trusted on this one.
Duran thought he had pulled Celtic level in the 29th minute in Paisley when he turned home Yang Hyun-jun’s delivery, only for an offside decision to eventually wipe the goal out following a lengthy VAR check.
It was desperately tight. Martin O’Neill was still questioning what he had seen after the final whistle.
Clattenburg, who refereed both the 2016 Champions League final and Euro 2016 final, has now looked at the incident after being approached by 67HH. His verdict will not satisfy many Celtic supporters.
“Celtic’s offside looks tight to the naked eye, and the player must be ahead of the ball and ahead of the second most rear defender for the decision to be given,” Clattenburg said.
“It’s a very tight one as he is ahead of the ball and it looks like a foot is ahead of the defender. We have to trust the match officials in this case, especially when it’s so tight.
“Offside is factual, and therefore 1cm is offside, and there is no margin to give the benefit of the doubt to the attacker.”
On the law itself, Clattenburg is right. Offside is treated as a factual decision. There is no provision for allowing a goal because the attacker was only marginally beyond the defender.
That is not really where the argument has been since Saturday night, though.
What Celtic fans want to know is whether the images and lines being used were accurate enough to establish that Duran was offside in the first place. When the difference is supposedly tiny, confidence in how that point has been measured becomes everything.
The confusion only increased later when Shim Mheuka had what would have been his first Celtic goal disallowed. On that occasion, the normal virtual offside lines could not be produced and referee Ryan Lee was sent to the monitor to make a judgement from the available footage.
That left Celtic with two goals chalked off on a night when VAR seemed to be permanently involved.
O’Neill’s side still did what mattered, recovering from a goal down to win 2-1 through Liam Scales and Yang, preserving their perfect Premiership start and moving five points clear at the top, although that has now been cut to three with Hearts win on Sunday.
Clattenburg may be prepared to trust the officials on Duran’s goal. After what Celtic supporters watched in Paisley, plenty will want to see considerably more evidence before doing the same. Our officials prove time and time again they cannot use VAR to any sort of standard.
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