Celtic faced off against Rangers last Saturday in the Glasgow derby and came away victorious as goals from Kyogo and Jota helped Ange Postecoglou’s men go 12 points clear at the top of the table.

As is always the case in a Glasgow derby, there were some contentious refereeing decisions.

Such calls are overly common in Scottish football in general and inevitably when there are poor ones, referees are looked at.

Several people put this refereeing incompetence down to a range of different factors and Sky Sports journalist Anthony Joseph believes it is due to refs being only part time in Scotland.

Speaking exclusively on the CeltsAreHere Flagship Podcast, Joseph said:

“I think refereeing is poor across the board in Scotland.

“The Scottish Premiership is a top 10 league and it’s in UEFA’s top 10 leagues going by the coefficient and yet we’ve got part time referees.

“I just don’t see how that’s allowed. You’ve got part time referees refereeing a professional game.

“I think that is the bigger issue of refereeing in Scotland.”

Scotland has always had referees whose sole job isn’t to take charge of football matches.

All officials have day jobs such as lawyers, teachers and policemen and only train for refereeing once or twice a week.

As Joseph points out, this will lead to a poorer standard of decision-making compared to other countries.

He did go on to say that suddenly making referees in Scotland full time would change things overnight but it would make a positive difference.

One wonders if this will ever transpire or if Scotland will always have part-time officials who are not of a high standard.