The Debrief: Scottish Premiership goes to final day

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1:07Alistair Bruce-Ball:On the Football Daily Podcast, The Debrief with Mark Chapman. What a night. What a dramatic night. What a controversial night in the race for the Scottish Premiership title. The easy part is that Hearts have beaten Falkirk by three goals to nil. And with five minutes of second half stoppage time gone at Motherwell, they thought they would be going to Celtic on Saturday lunchtime with a three point lead and Celtic having to win by three goals to win the title. Then Celtic were awarded a penalty, apparently for handball, which they've scored. And they win 3-2 to Celtic at Fir Park, which means there's one point between the two.

1:56so now Hearts have to avoid defeat at Celtic to win the title let's deal with the easy part first of all with Alistair Bruce Ball which is Hearts 3-0 win over Falkirk

2:09Alistair Bruce-Ball:yeah we knew it was going to to and fro tonight Mark but I just think the reaction of both stadiums actually here at Tynecastle and at Fur Park as well told the story you know almost without the commentary you didn't need it Blair Spittel scored a third goal for Hearts late in the second half here. And as you say, at that point, you know, suddenly Hearts are thinking, crikey, we can go to Celtic, lose 1-0, lose 2-0, lose by a couple of goals and still win the title. And then, you know, the news after the full-time whistle had blown here came through of the late Celtic penalty. The Hearts players here had already done their sort of lap of honour, lap of appreciation.

2:46Alistair Bruce-Ball:They've had an unbeaten season at home in the league. What a season it's been full stop. And that slightly took the wind out of the sails. And I think the question for Hearts will be going into that final game of the season at Celtic is, you know, I'm sure they will. But can they summon the energy and the spirit? And they've lost a couple of key players to injury in the last game against Motherwell. And Cammy Devlin had to come off because he looked exhausted tonight. Claudio Braga was running on empty as well. But bottom line is, it's in their hands, Hearts. And Derek McInnes said, the manager said at the start of the week, I think Celtic will win tonight.

3:20Alistair Bruce-Ball:We will need four points to win the title. Well, that is how it's played out. They won this game by three goals to nil. Nervy start, got themselves 2-0 up by half-time with a Frankie Kent bullet header and Cammie Devlin's goal. And like I say, it then went quiet in the second half a bit, but Motherwell scored to get it back to 2-2. This stadium came to life. Spittel then scored the third, and it was really, really looking good for Hearts. But it's never over until it's over. It isn't. Let's get details of the game at Fir Park. I can see on my screen Marta O 'Neill's about to talk to television, so I'll try and bring you some of his quotes shortly.

3:55I mean, I would imagine there's a press box there, Kenny Crawford, trying to work out what exactly has gone on. Yeah, a lot of confused faces over the last few minutes, Mark, including mine, and it was just a bizarre sequence of events when you went to think we were seconds away from the final whistle and it being 2-2 waiting in a player that we thought was injured with a head injury just to get up from his haunches and play on and all of a sudden, out of nowhere, there was a VAR check for John Beaton to consult and all of a sudden a penalty for Kelechi Iheanacho, the former Man City and Leicester player, to convert into the bottom left-hand corner.

4:28What seemed like hours before that, Elliot Watt had put Motherwell 1-0 up with a half-volley from the edge of the box, which an unsighted Sinisalo couldn't keep out. And then Dyson Maeda, who's on brilliant form just now, levelled for Celtic on 41 minutes with an arrowing shot in off the post to level things at half-time. Then after the break, Benjamin Negrin does what he does best, and that's score terrific goals. He picked the ball up on the edge of the box and left-footed. The Swede thumped it into the top right-hand corner. A really, really good goal by a really good player this season. We thought Celtic would see the win out, but then Liam Gordon popped up.

5:05He came on in the 81st minute as a substitute to shore things up, but then ended up in the opposition box. And after Tawanda Maswinisi, Zimbabwe International, with a couple of efforts blocked, Gordon was there to steer in a finish into the bottom right-hand corner to make it 2-2. then five minutes of play were added on and in the 95th and 30 seconds or something like that that incident happened that we just spoke about and the penalty was awarded and all of a sudden it's impacted Motherwell in a big way as well because of Hibs' win at Rangers Motherwell are in a tight spot with securing fourth they're still I think one point clear of Hibs but then Hibs host Motherwell at Easter Road on Saturday so all of a sudden their certain European place isn't guaranteed so it wasn't as if Motherwell had nothing to play for tonight They were wanting a point or a win just as much as Celtic were.

5:52And all of a sudden, as we said, Derek McInnes' players go from having loads of hope, still to having a lot of hope, but just with those shoulders slumped a bit. But I think Derek McInnes, the manager that he is, I've spoken to you before, Mark, about how wily and how experienced he is. He's experienced back in those days in 2003, the battle of Bramall Lane for West Brom. He knows how to conduct himself. He knows how to get the most out of his players. and he'll probably use this as a galvanising thing. Listen, we've had a referee decision go against us on the Saturday night. We've had a referee decision go against us on the Wednesday night.

6:25Let's make sure we turn up and do the business on Saturday to show that not even these decisions can spoil us. So let's just see how things go. But it's so much drama. Are you surprised, Kenny? And I'll bring Pat in in a moment. And Ryan Stevenson, the former Hearts forward, so obviously we know from which direction he has come in here. But he said on BBC Sports Sound, VAR took six minutes in the recent West Ham Arsenal game because everyone understood how big a decision it was. I don't think in the end it was six minutes. Darren Kan timed it. I think it may be 2.58 or something. John Beaton was at the monitor for, what, 20 seconds?

7:01He made that decision, and I go back to the angles discussion we were having. I have no idea whether you would hope he got shown more angles than we got shown, but he made that decision very quickly. Yeah, and that would suggest that a lot of his confidence is perhaps being placed in the VAR team, which is contrast to the decision the other night where Steve McLean was called over and the VAR team were almost kind of recommending he looks at a potential penalty and he sticks with his own decision. So there's going to be so much conjecture comes out of this decision, Mark. I mean, you actually couldn't script this.

7:38You actually couldn't script all the drama that's happening in Scotland this season. It's so good that it's happening. And we've got a title race that's alive to this stage in the season. But the amount of twists and turns, whether it be VAR calls or late goals. And Hearts have had a few winners late on as well. I've got to say that too. They've scrambled out a few results. But it's just unbelievable. but in Celtic Park on Saturday afternoon, Connor McNamara is going to have a field day commentating in that one. It's going to be a brilliant match. Let me read you a couple of other comments. Tom English, BBC Scotland's chief sports writer.

8:13People are enraged by the penalty. To me, it looks like it comes off his head. I need to see it more, but the substantial contact comes off his head. It is unimaginable drama. It is a huge call, a massive call to make, given the context of the season. and Darren O'Day speaking to BBC Scotland. So a former Celtic player, Pat, Darren, looking at the footage we've just watched, it's made huge contact with Nicholson's head because of the trajectory the ball takes. I don't know how you can conclusively say that is handball. It is an unfathomably huge call. I mean, it is a huge call. A huge call. It definitely is.

8:54And again, if I could see more of it, But everyone's saying the same things. Oh, I've actually just got a little view of it here. I don't know that that's his. I've got it on a bigger monitor now and slowed down. I don't think you can conclusively say that has hit full on a hand. I don't think you can. I would say it's likely to have hit his hand because it's up in that area. But it looks like his head. It really looks like his head. It's gone 15 yards off it. I mean, that hasn't come... No, it's not his hand. It's definitely hit his head, but when you freeze it, it absolutely looks like his hand.

9:33So it's one of those ones. Really, when you freeze it, we've just done a little rock and roll of it in the camera there. And from the rock and roll angle, which I am guessing is the only angle the referee was shown... That's the only angle that has been shown on any monitor in this studio. I've seen no other angle. well if he showed the first angle which is the camera one you know from the halfway line you know that he's not giving that right he's just not giving it you're right that other one where you do the wee close-up and you rock and roll it you know forward and backwards that that looks more like a handball that's the one that looks like a handball so and again honestly we will watch this a hundred times and you seeing it again do you know what chappers if i had to absolutely stick my neck out and say what?

10:24I would say it touch the edge of his pinky. Yeah. I would go that far. That's about it.

10:31Alistair Bruce-Ball:His hand is in a strange position there. I'm not quite sure why he's jumping like that with his hand there, which obviously brings about the... I think he's gone up to try and manoeuvre Trusty out the way a bit. It's a good point, actually. It's Trusty's shoulder that forces his hand up there, and his hand actually catches Trusty in the face. But I agree. You look at how that ball flies. you know that's 80 % at least contact with the head and a glancing blow on the hand which hasn't really had a yeah material impact on it that's that oof blimey. But then if it's at your hand and your hand's in a natural position by the letter of the law it's a penalty kick so I bet I mean if you're a Hearts fan I'm honestly the great thing is we have now seen this about 30 times and I bet you every Celtic fan thinks that's a clear handball every single every single City fan will be saying that apart from Darren and Dale obviously but it's honestly you could watch it forever but I will go so far as to say it's hit his head we can say that for sure right we can definitely say that but it's also possibly hit his hand as well but can I say it's definitely hit his hand I don't know if I can how does it looks like it it looks like it in slow motion it really does I think I think if you are I mean, if you are a fan, if you are a Hearts fan, then you are, when you see that, you are absolutely fuming if you couple it with what happened at Motherwell on Saturday night.

11:57What's more interesting is how Derek McInnes uses, as Kenny pointed out, uses the two reactions to the two penalty incidents ahead of Saturday. or whether he doesn't, in fact, Pat, whether he doesn't and goes down a different route? There are a number of ways to tackle this. May I underline one thing? I think the previous decision was worse. This one's debatable. What, the penalty on Saturday night? The one, yeah, that has lost, that didn't get against Mullo. That wasn't debatable for me. That's a penalty. Whereas this one, there's a debate. There's an absolute debate about it. and have your debate and have your ideas about it.

12:43I didn't have a debate about the penalty the other night there. Hearts should have got a penalty. So I can understand and rightly feel that Hearts should be aggrieved at it. But if you go and tell them to be too aggrieved, they might go and chase the next game and kick people and end up getting another decision behind them. You need to go with a positive mental attitude of, OK, you've beaten Celtic before. All right, Celtic have to go and beat you if you're Hearts. a draw is enough go back to that phrase we talked about much much earlier on at the start of the season if you just say to Derry McInnes and all the Hearts fans by the way all you need to do is go to Celtic Pan get a draw in the last game of the season you win the league they'll bite your hand off for it they absolutely will Mark talking about debates I'm looking down at the first part pitch at the moment and there are four Motherwell players looking at a phone I'm speculating but I imagine they're looking at the plays of that handball one of the players is motherwell's on loan defender stephen welsh from celtic and he couldn't play tonight ineligible but just a penny for his thoughts on loan at motherwell that happens and he's talking about it with his motherwell teammates but his parent club has benefited from a very strange situation as he now chases what appears to be his little boy with

13:56Alistair Bruce-Ball:football we've seen it 25 times now again again again they're rolling again and again again it's like those grounded catches in cricket where you just to me sometimes you just you cannot tell it's not conclusive you can't you know definitively say i don't think from the angles that we are seeing at the moment and that's all we're seeing at the moment it you know it that doesn't look conclusive to me yes and it has to be conclusive because it's a clear and obvious error that's what we're looking for and i don't know if it's a clear and obvious error to ignore that and chappers your point of you didn't feel any celtic players complained about it so the only people I've seen it as somebody who's looked at it and got a magnifying glass out and thought, right, I'm going to try and find something here.

14:40That's what the Harts fans will think. I genuinely thought, Pat, that they'd gone to be able to wonder whether there was an elbow because trusty went down holding his head. That's what I thought, which, I mean, again, I don't think there was anything in that either. I tell you what, we'll just pause, we'll look ahead a little bit to Saturday's game in a moment but let's hear from the Celtic manager here is Martin O 'Neill

15:09Alistair Bruce-Ball:I have seen it back very very briefly it's a handball, it looks as if it's also an elbow to the side of the head as well too but the VAR have asked the referee to come over and have a look at it and no hesitation in giving the penalty. In terms of what your side showed there tonight in terms of fight, desire to get this over the line. There was quality goals in there as well, we have to say, as well. I mean, you go into a monumental weekend. What do you make of all this and where do you think you stand in terms of getting into a game like that? We may not win it, but what we have done is that we have fought really impressively, I think, throughout these last number of weeks when we lost at Tanadise.

15:52Alistair Bruce-Ball:Now I keep going back to that there. It was unimaginable for us to get back into the race in many aspects. thinking that you couldn't even drop a point. We couldn't drop a point. And for us to win the league, we couldn't drop a point from then on in. And that takes a lot of doing, I must admit. But sometimes I think that the players, well, not sometimes I think, I think they've shown enormous character, enormous character here to keep fighting right to the very, very end. And they've done that again. And we'll take hearts on on Saturday. It could go either way, it could go any way, but at least we've taken it to the final game.

16:33I mean, fair play to Martin for spotting his handball on one replay that he's seen, so that's which nobody else seems to have done. Where you would back him up, and this is fair, Pat, and just because it's Celtic, we shouldn't dismiss this. The way they have fought to get themselves back into this and going behind, you know, they were behind at Motherwell, and Motherwell at times, as Kenny, I'm sure, would agree, were the dominant side at Fir Park today, and yet they've come out with a win, whatever you think of the decision. Behind at home to Rangers at the weekend, they've come out with a win.

17:06Yeah, look, the fairytale for everybody looking at the outside, the vast majority of people is hearts going win the league after all this, because that's the story. I mean, it's a story, but not a gigantic story of Celtic winning 14 times out of 15, right? So you take that all on board. So there is an upset and an anger, but Celtic have done a brilliant job. Martin Inouye was done an extraordinary job. In the midst of all this, I'm saying that penalty kick there, yeah, I can't tell. It's not absolutely conclusive, but, you know, it might be and it might not be. Sometimes you get decisions, sometimes you don't get the decisions.

17:41But you just need to deal with it. You need to live with it. And in the future, you'll look back on it and people will say, yeah, big Glasgow club's typical. That's the way it works. Can't think that way at all. Celtic still have to go out and beat Hearts, which they've not done this season, I believe. So it's all absolutely out in the open. Do you know what I really do want to harm Chappers? I don't want this to be decided in a last-minute handball decision that we don't agree with. And you know what? I wouldn't put it past this competition because we're talking about chopped and changed. I took a wee note here during the game.

18:14During this one game, Hearts were one point ahead, then two points ahead, then four points ahead, then three points ahead, then one point ahead, then three points ahead, then one point ahead. One game. so that's the madness that we have had during this one game and it's been like that all season brilliant so let's love the good parts of it as well and just to back up what Pat says Hearts have beaten Celtic at Tynecastle 3-1 they won 2-1 at Celtic Park they had a 2-1 draw in Edinburgh in January and tonight Ali as well after a nervy 10-15 minutes they were always comfortable

18:50Alistair Bruce-Ball:yeah they were they got into their groove and they lost a couple of key players going into tonight and I think that actually did just unsettle them a little bit at the back in the first 10 minutes and there was a slip from Frankie Kent early on and the ball was in the back of the hearts net from Miller, Calvin Miller who scored the goal that was ruled out for offside but once they'd settled and once the fans were probably with them all the way there was only ever going to be one winner in this game by the way I've just seen another comment from Chris Boyd well many people in Scotland will know Chris Boyd will have a certain angle on it to be said but we're talking about those two penalty kicks that were important for this race but then the red card call that Rangers didn't Rangers expecting a red card for Alistair Johnson at the weekend, now I actually did see that I was at that game and it was one of those ones where Johnson actually caught the ball perfectly cleanly but then the follow through looked horrible and it's one of those ones see if you showed the referee that didn't show any context just show the contact mmm it just sent him off right but you have to show context I then take you back to tonight's one well see if you just showed the referee that one little rock and roll backwards that looks like handball see if the referee was only given that I don't blame him I really don't blame him for that because that looks like a handball but you must give context and the way the ball comes in etc so I'll be very keen to see what the officials say about that but again we will argue forever about this I say forever until half past 12 on Saturday afternoon Just to come in very quickly on the Martin O 'Neill effect that Pat was talking about a few minutes ago he's been in charge of 22 league games this season he's won 18 of them he's drawn 2 and only 2 defeats so he's taken 56 points from a possible 66 in the league and can you just imagine if the Wilfred Nancey period hadn't happened and they just stuck with O 'Neill after that first interim period.

20:51It could have all been wrapped up by now because somehow this guy has just got Celtic going again. I remember back in September, October, speaking to him at a press conference where he was up to promote something else at Hampden and we were just standing at the side of the pitch and he was talking about how he was involved with his grandchildren and things like that. He had no idea anything like this was going to happen.

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22:18Alistair Bruce-Ball:BBC Radio 5 Live. Patrick Kielsey. Stumbling your way into Saturday mornings with great guests. Judy Murray is here. I love sport and I wanted to pass that on to my kids. Kids taking down commentators. Final score. BB2. Steve Buns won. Football chants from the gods. Rhythm is a dancer, concert is the answer. You should see him in the air. The less that about the host, the better. Patrick Hilty. Saturdays from nine. Listen on BBC Sounds.

22:54Alistair Bruce-Ball:On the Football Daily Podcast, The Debrief. With Mark Chapman. Derek McInnes has called it a disgusting call. They are his words for the decision to give Celtic a late penalty at Motherwell. Let's talk to somebody with connections with both Motherwell and Celtic, who's been watching this game in Germany and also plenty of managerial experience. He will tell us how he would have dealt with it as well. Paul Lambert joins us on Five Live. Evening, Paul, how are you? Hi, Mark, how are you? I'm very well, thank you. Are you puzzled? Are you surprised at how quickly he made the call? I mean, what's your overriding view of the incident, first of all?

23:36I'm not a fan of Mark anyway. I've never been. And you've got to let the referee call it how he sees it on the actual initial incident. I can see from Marble's point of view, they'd be absolutely raging. I can see from Celtic's point of view, that it gives them a great chance of winning the league. You just have to deal with it. There's no point in having all these arguments over. You deal with it, you've got all of it. Celtic have won the match. They'll go to the last game of the season and they'll go and try and win it. And I'm pretty sure the way the crowd is there and the atmosphere is there, that Celtic will come out of the traps.

24:13They've got a bit of momentum going. But you're going to have all the conspiracy theories in Glasgow, which is always going to happen. And you deal with it. You go on with it. You don't cry about it. You go on with it. If you were in Derek McInnes' situation now, would you be using that to fire you? Or Ponce, I'd say, how would you play it? managerial-wise. Because let's not forget, Hearts don't have to go held for leather at Celtic Park. That's the other thing here. So it's an interesting balancing act he's got over the coming days, isn't it? Well, I think, as I said, you're asking my opinion, I don't really know Derek that well.

24:47But I think if you grasp onto that, I think you could come unstuck. I think you've just got to go there and there's still no driving seat with it. So I think if you let the emotion take over and you can't handle the occasion, you'll lose. and I think that's the way it probably happens. If Harts want to moan about it in the next few days and things like that, it happens. These things happen in football and you can ask any football person that's been involved in games. There's been games where you get decisions, you don't get them. If you cry over it, then the emotion of the game can really hurt you and if Harts can't handle their emotion, then they'll lose.

25:25Celtic then favour its views, you say, particularly with the home advantage. Absolutely. Just because I know what it's like there. When that crowd get their tails up and Celtic get their tails up, they're very, very hard to stop. I know it's not a Celtic team of old, but they've still got decent players. I think they've got that. They've got a manager there who knows it inside out and the way he gets people to run through walls for them. He knows exactly what he's going to do. And if, listen, the gaffer there, as I call him, there's only one person who could have salvaged that season was him. didn't matter who it was he was the only one that could have done it for them Paul thank you very much for joining us this evening hope you're well Paul Lambert with us on Five Live Sport can you play for a draw Pat can they play for a draw no chance it's not going to happen it just can't it's Celtic Park if you do that you've been up there as well the feeling within that stadium when it's full when they've got something to cheer on it's not going to happen and it would play into Celtic's hands in many ways and remember But they're missing a lot of defenders.