Alleged Betting Scandal Threatens ‘Integrity’ Of Scottish Game

In some ways, the snow stole the referees’ thunder. The brutal blow of a referee walk-out from all senior fixtures in Scotland was softened by a begrudging mother nature, who proceeded to dump enough snow to halt a Winter Olympics on Scottish football fields regardless of any civil action from the whistlers.

And with a distinct lack of action north of the border forcing us to endure Saturday afternoon Christmas shopping with the missus, untangling the tree lights only to uncover the one bulb not working just as you put them up, or even worse, listening to Robbie Savage blunder his way through the English language on BBC Radio Five Live, the fiery nature of the Scottish referee debate seemed to have been cooled by the recent cold snap.

So with the notorious Fir Park pitch deemed suitable for action, the Sky cameras descended upon a sparsely populated fixture between Motherwell and Hearts last night to set the record straight; that Scottish football was alive and well.

A debatable penalty decision, several questionable free-kicks awards, a frankly shameful sending off and the resulting allegations of betting irregularities later, and the health of the sport in Scotland has been plunged back into intensive care.

Following the bizarre sending off of Motherwell’s Steve Jennings by referee, Stevie O’Reilly, towards the tail-end of last night’s tie, the association of British bookmakers have been alerted to irregular betting patterns, as several bets, each of a value of between £200 and £500, originating in the Liverpool area, were placed on the prediction of a sending off occurring at some point during the match.

Jennings, who had already been booked, received a straight red card in the 82nd minute for what appeared to be an innocuous tap on the shoulder of O’Reilly after disputing the decision not to award the home side a spot kick, after Motherwell had been on the wrong end of a series of poor decisions.

The SFA, alongside the Scottish Premier League, are now set to investigate the claims immediately, and issued a statement shortly after the news broke.

“We are aware of alleged betting irregularities surrounding a sending off incident. At this stage, we are not in possession of the facts regarding the allegations and are waiting for further information from the Scottish Premier League in due course.

“Once we are in possession of all the facts, we will be in a better position to provide more detailed comment on the matter. In the meantime, we will be working with our colleagues at the SPL to establish the details surrounding this incident”.

The details of such allegations are sketchy at best currently, but with the sport in Scotland precariously placed in the already fragile minds of the punters, the feeling is that if these staggering claims are proven, it has the potential to blow the Scottish variant of the sport into pieces.

Of course it is easy to jump to conclusions, and one has to remember the principle, ‘innocent until proven guilty’. But following the strike, in protest of increasing criticism of officials’ performance and integrity, last night’s display by O’Reilly, leaves both aspects shrouded in doubt and suspicion, once again.

The nature of the baffling decisions made by last night’s official in question will have done nothing to quell the barrage of criticism regarding his profession’s recent performances in senior football. But it is the bombshell of these betting allegations that, if proven, will have a fatal impact on the integrity the referees feel is under scrutiny.

However, even if such claims prove to be unfounded, the integrity of our referees has ended up under the spotlight once again, despite calls for the debate to come to an end from the referees’ union.

Such negativity can only have a detrimental effect on a sport which was already struggling with dwindling finances, dwindling crowd numbers, a deficiency in enthusiasm and quality, a failing national side and the walk-out of our referees.

Add to that sobering list the possibility of a betting scandal, and the prediction of even more fixtures falling victim to forecast snowfall sounds all the more appealing. Anything to stop the pain.

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