JOHN HARTSON is thankful that VAR has been voted in by Scottish clubs but believes that the SPFL should bring referees from other countries to Scotland so that there is no bias.

All forty-two SPFL clubs met to vote on the introduction of VAR after the World Cup at the end of this year. Only one club opposed the introduction, the club is currently unnamed, but it’s said that they are not in the top division.

This came after Bobby Madden’s poor performance in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final when Hartson was vocal with his opinions of the refereeing display.

“VAR has to come in because it will help the referees,” Hartson said on Go Radio.

“As long as we get the right people sitting behind the VAR. Maybe people that come up from London, who have not got any allegiances to any football clubs in Scotland.

“Because otherwise, you’re going to have the same problems. You’re going to get decisions and people will be making all sorts of things up – ‘who does this guy support, where do his loyalties lie?’.

“It will go on and on, it will run. But I have to say Bobby Madden’s performance at the weekend was dreadful.

“The referee – how many occasions should he have booked a player? Not just for Celtic but for Rangers.

“He let so many go there could have been a couple of sending offs. He almost chose to ignore it.”

Hartson is correct. The current bunch of referees operating VAR is a disaster waiting to happen.

Having VAR isn’t going to solve the majority of problems in Scottish football. For the referees that are not biased, they’re just not very good at their jobs.

There is no straightforward answer to the refereeing problem in Scotland, but bringing in VAR with the same incompetent referees will not take as many steps forward as some people think it will.