The Scottish FA has ruled that Celtic should not have been awarded the stoppage-time penalty that turned a 2-2 draw with Motherwell into a 3-2 win at Fir Park last week. The key match incident panel said the decision to give Kelechi Iheanacho the chance to score from the spot in the 99th minute was wrong.
The penalty came after VAR Andrew Dallas told referee John Beaton that he believed Motherwell winger Sam Nicholson had handled the ball while contesting an aerial challenge with Celtic defender Auston Trusty. Beaton then watched the pitchside monitor for around 20 seconds before pointing to the spot, and Iheanacho converted to secure the win that helped Celtic clinch the title on the final day.
That ruling mattered beyond the result itself. Celtic needed only to beat Hearts on the final day after leaving Fir Park with all three points, but a draw would have meant they required a three-goal victory to finish top. Hearts ended the season two points behind Celtic, so the incident at Fir Park altered the championship equation at the most sensitive moment of the season.
The backlash was immediate and fierce. Hearts boss Derek McInnes called the decision “disgusting”, while Motherwell player Elliot Watt said it was “the worst VAR decision in history”. Celtic manager Martin O'Neill took the opposite view, saying it “looks as if it's a pretty clear cut” and adding that Beaton had given it for the handball and “an elbow on top of that there as well”.
The panel’s ruling also came on the same day another major VAR call was judged to be wrong. In the separate Hearts match at Fir Park, Steven McLean stuck by his initial decision not to award Hearts a penalty when the score was 1-1, despite VAR Greg Aitken indicating that Alexandros Kyziridis had been tripped by Tawanda Maswanhise. That left two decisive calls at the same ground under renewed scrutiny.
The controversy has also carried a personal cost for Beaton. He was put under police protection after his personal details were leaked online last week, a move that underlined how heated the reaction has become around officials. The Scottish Senior Football Referees Association has described the treatment of referees over the past month as “entirely disproportionate”, with the debate over video review now running far beyond one match or one club.
The panel’s conclusion should settle the footballing argument over the incident itself, but it does not erase what followed it. The decision changed the title path, fuelled anger from rival camps and left the officials at the centre of a storm that Scottish football has still not managed to calm.
