Head of refereeing Willie Collum has addressed the controversial penalty incident from Celtic’s 4-1 win over Ross County earlier this month, effectively dismissing Kris Boyd’s calls for a red card and clarifying the correct application of the laws.
The incident in question occurred when Alistair Johnston fouled Kieran Phillips from behind, leading to a penalty after a VAR check.
While the penalty itself wasn’t disputed, Kris Boyd’s post-match reaction on Sky Sports sparked debate as he insisted Celtic should have been reduced to 10 men.
“I cannot understand why that’s not a red card. There’s no attempt to play the ball; he’s denied a goal-scoring opportunity. He nudged his back, he said it himself. Celtic should be down to 10 men there,” Boyd ranted.
However, Boyd’s outburst was immediately countered by Chris Sutton, who offered a more measured take:
“You don’t see a red card for that.”
Now, on this month’s VAR Review show, Willie Collum has provided a detailed breakdown of the incident, explaining why the challenge was correctly not deemed a red card.
“The key thing for us here is about the word ‘obvious’—an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. There’s no doubt it is an opportunity, but when the foul happens, the ball is in mid-air, only just coming into the penalty area.
“For us, there is not enough to say that at that stage this is obvious. This is not where a player has the ball right in front of them about to tap it into the goal.
“A lot of people might disagree with that, but we’re aligning ourselves with UEFA’s thinking and the understanding given by FIFA about denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. They do not want a red card for this kind of scenario.”
While Collum acknowledged that the referee made a mistake by failing to issue any card at all, he stressed that the incident should have resulted in a yellow card—not a red.
Collum’s explanation effectively shuts down Boyd’s red card claims, confirming that the decision to award a penalty without a sending-off was in line with current officiating standards.
While the referee should have shown a yellow card, there was no justification for a red, proving that Boyd’s post-match meltdown was—unsurprisingly—off the mark.
