IT IS almost impossible to work out what the more serious offence is: tying a scarf to some wood or throwing a piece of paper. Thankfully, we’ll know by the end of this week.
Leigh Griffiths is in bother with UEFA for wrapping some wool around a goalpost at the end of a match. Rangers yesterday were fined £6,200 because a few of their fans indulged in some overarm origami at Ibrox during the first leg against Progres Niederkorn of Luxembourg.
To put this in some sort of context, there are stadiums in Europe where black players are routinely abused and yet the clubs always seem to escape bans. I’m glad to see the beaks in Nyon have their priorities right.
Read more: Leigh Griffiths is trouble but Brendan Rodgers would never allow him to leave Celtic
Let’s start with the punishment handed out to Rangers, perhaps the first in football history where if the crime had taken place in a primary school, the teacher would dish out a quick verbal warning to the kids and then get on with the class.
Should Rangers fans have thrown paper onto the pitch? No. Did anyone who was there think anything of it apart from the UEFA official?
The only people who would see this A4 attack as anything other than a bit silly are the kind who lost the plot on Sunday when they realised one of those women folk was to play a shape-shifting fictional Time Lord on a television show.
And then there is the bold Leigh. Bless him.
This columnist tried his best to steer away from Buckfast, bottles, Belfast and bampottery, but it’s hard to move on when tomorrow UEFA could find Celtic guilty on two charges.
There has been quite a bit written and spoken about what happened at Windsor Park last Friday night and who was to blame for a heavy glass object being thrown at another human being. In case you are wondering, it was the bloke who chucked the bottle and not the bloke whose ear it almost took off.
Read more: Leigh Griffiths is trouble but Brendan Rodgers would never allow him to leave Celtic
UEFA have charged Griffiths for “provoking spectators” at the end of an evening in which he’d had coins and said Bucky bottle thrown at him. You would never see that in Scotland. For one thing, it was a half bottle and wasn’t empty. I mean, honestly.
Now should Griffiths have done that? Again, that’s a no. It was daft, verging on the irresponsible, given where he was and what had happened.
But if you believe his actions were so terrible that had a riot occurred it would have been his fault, you have set the bar pretty low in terms of when if ever a riot – and such coming togethers tend to be violent affairs – is justifiable.
My guess is Griffiths will get a reprimand, as will Celtic, who have been charged for not being able to keep control of the team.
This means they had five players yellow-carded, including the Griffiths booking for time-wasting when some locals were using his head for target practice.
Ah, but it’s Griffiths, The wee toerag. Wasn’t he caught on camera signing a racist song about Rudi Skacel? Yes, he was and the footage from a few years back did not show him in a great light.
But while I’ve never met any of the Linfield fans who have put their own club in trouble – they also have two UEFA charges to answer – my guess is they didn’t attempt to injure Griffiths in protest about his refugee song.
Read more: Leigh Griffiths is trouble but Brendan Rodgers would never allow him to leave Celtic
I might be wrong, but the lad who smuggled the bottle into the ground didn’t do it because he wanted to make an overt political statement about the displaced people of the world.
UEFA is a shambles of an organisation with a history of getting things dead wrong.
The Rangers fine is laughable and if Griffiths must pay out as well then it’s the association’s way of saying that had someone got to him on the pitch, and a few tried, then he was sort of asking for it.
I’ve said this many times, but if you are the type of person who will be provoked into breaking the law – that means throwing a bottle, because a footballer who plays for a team you don’t support does something that slightly annoys you – then seek medical help.
Neither club is whiter than white. Both Celtic and Rangers have amassed a lengthy list of misdemeanours over the years. But these trumped-up charges are, quite frankly, ridiculous.
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