Neil Lennon last night called upon officials and police to prioritise the safety of all those in and around the pitch after a bottle throwing incident marred Celtic’s Scottish Cup win over Hibernian last night.
Scott Sinclair had a glass bottle of Buckfast thrown at him as he went to take a corner at Easter Road with television cameras capturing the incident as the winger went to take the set-piece. Hibs were later informed by police that a second bottle had been thrown during the game.
It is the latest in a number of incidents this season. Lennon himself was hit by a coin at Tynecastle earlier this season while Kris Boyd had a coin thrown at him at Rugby Park a fortnight ago. Rangers striker Alfredo Morelos was hit by a coin in a game against St Mirren in November while a linesman was struck with a coin at Livingston by a visiting Rangers support in the earlier part of the season.
“It’s just a real sore point of this season,” said Lennon. “Bottles, coins, flares, it’s just totally unacceptable. These players should be out there, should be the safest environment to be.
“They are entertaining the public, whether that be the Celtic public, the Scottish public. Officials and management, it should be a safe environment for us to come and do our job and work and enjoy it.
“I don’t like to see it, it’s got to be stamped out. It’s just happening far too often. That could really have really hurt Scott and if it had then God knows what we’d be talking about now.
“I’m not sure if he was aware of it, I haven’t had a chance to speak to him yet. I don’t know why it’s happening, it must be a social thing. But we’ve seen officials, players, managers with coins and bottles and it’s not on.
“We need to find the culprits, arrest them and punish them. You can’t stop individual from moments of madness when they have probably had too much to drink.”
Hibs manager Paul Heckingbottom and Celtic captain Scott Brown united in their condemnation of the incident. A statement from Hibs in the immediate aftermath of the game lamented the incident but claimed there had been more than one bottle thrown.
“We will review the CCTV footage and work with the appropriate authorities to identify those involved in throwing items onto the pitch,” it read. “We understand two bottles were thrown, one from each set of supporters. This is entirely unacceptable and puts players and others at risk. The match was a good game, played in a great spirit but unfortunately yet again the headlines will be around this kind of unacceptable conduct.”
Heckingbottom was equally irked by the incident. Hibs' Darren McGregor also threw a burning flare off the pitch as the visiting support celebrated James Forrest's goal.
“I've just been told about it,” he said. “No-one wants to see things like that so wherever it's come from, whoever’s thrown it, we need to find them.
“It's happening a little bit too often at the moment and everyone needs to be behind the effort to stop it. It seems to be happening a little bit more up here but it's still happening all over, we haven't got rid of it totally in England.
“No-one wants in it and everyone - police, governing bodies, clubs, fans in amongst them - need to help.”
Celtic captain Brown too condemned the thuggish behaviour.
“You don't want to see bottles or coins being thrown at players, it's not nice,” he said. “You never know, it could hit someone in the eye. It's a big problem in the game but it happens at every ground. It's not just one team or stadium. I know it's an emotional game but it's a game of football and you don't want anyone getting smacked in the head by bottles or coins.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel