Rules are rules.

In any walk of life, or any contest, quiz or award, there are guidelines, rules, and qualification criteria. And, of course, one cannot make one rule for one person - including for, or perhaps especially, for successful people - and another for everyone else. But hard rules always throw up contestable anomalies.

This has been dramatically shown in the case of the Critics' Awards for Theatre in Scotland (CATS) this week. These distinguished awards, with a judging panel that include noted critics from The Herald, have unveiled their 2015 short lists this week, in ten categories.

Still Game, a quintessentially Scottish success story which transferred spectacularly from TV to the stage last year, is in none of the categories. This is because, as the CATS award rules state, the show was not "substantially" produced in Scotland. It was produced by Phil McIntyre Entertainments of London, and therefore could not qualify for the awards. Greg Hemphill, one of the stars and writer of the show, is perhaps right to question whether such a Scottish show in spirit, with a Scottish cast, Scottish writers and staged in Glasgow, could not be considered a "Scottish production".

There was, CATS judges say, no animus towards the show among its panel, instead respect was paid to a clear rule. Perhaps, following this case, these rules could - aptly for a critics' awards - be reviewed.