Ex-Celtic star Leigh Griffiths only has himself to blame for becoming a pariah – nothing to do with “Old Firm stigma”
IT’S sad to hear as big a talent as Leigh Griffiths admit that his time may be up at just 32.
Despite being a free agent who says “everything is negotiable”, the phone simply isn’t ringing — and he’s coming round to the thought that football might not be for him any more.
For a guy with seven league titles to his name and who just five years ago was lifting the roof off Hampden with two world-class free-kicks against England, it just doesn’t seem right.
But Griff knows he’s the only one to blame for becoming a pariah now.
That’s why I take issue with his claim during an interview with Radio Scotland that not being able to walk to the shops without taking abuse is “the stigma of playing with one side of the Old Firm”.
No, Leigh, it’s not.
Plenty guys from either side, be they players or managers, CAN buy a pint of milk, go out for a coffee or have a quiet lunch with pals without taking stick — because they haven’t courted trouble for most of their careers.
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It would be hard not to think that the time to realise this was a decade ago.
FINGERS crossed the knock Martin Boyle picked up at Easter Road on Saturday doesn’t jeopardise his World Cup dreams.
Not just for the sake of adopted Aussie, below, himself.
But because it’s a tournament which can ill afford to lose much more talent from its ranks.
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At the last count, 48 stars from the competing nations had either been ruled out or are racing against time to be fit.
Take France, who are definitely minus Rafael Varane, N’Golo Kante and Boubacar Kamara and possibly Paul Pobga, Lucas Digne and Lucas Hernandez too.
England will likely be missing Reece James, Kalvin Phillips, Kyle Walker, while Paolo Dybala, Angel di Maria and Juan Foyth are all serious doubts for Argentina.
On and on the list goes, reminding us how stupid it was to shoehorn what’s supposed to be the greatest show on earth into the middle of a jam-packed season.
Between this brainless planning, the scandal of how workers have been mistreated and the rampant homophobia, one thing’s for sure.
Fifa will get the event they deserve.
TONY WATT wasn’t sent off for a stamp on Saturday.
He was sent off for a thought crime.
There’s no other way to explain the VAR decision that earned the Dundee United striker a red card before half-time at home to Motherwell.
On the pitch, ref John Beaton saw what most of the rest of us did — a guy trying a clever flick that doesn’t come off, realising he’s going to catch his opponent and trying his best to pull out.
That’s why he didn’t give a foul in real time, never mind get the book out.
But back in a studio many miles away, video official David Munro quite clearly and obviously decided he knew what Watt’s intentions were in the split-second BEFORE he tried to pull out.
That might be a clever trick if he fancies a part-time career as a mind-reader, but it’s not what he’s there for on matchdays.
He’s not there to surmise, he’s not there to impose his opinions on the guy in the middle, he’s there to bring that guy’s attention to stuff he hasn’t seen.
And the key here is that John Beaton DID see the incident.
He was in a textbook position, no more than five yards away, with no obstructions.
So if what we’re now saying is that his experience isn’t worth a toss, if we’re saying that the guy in the studio is there to re-referee big moments . . . well, we might as well not HAVE a whistler out there in the flesh.
My one criticism of Beaton is that he didn’t have the courage of his convictions to look at the pitchside screen and stick by his instincts.
I’m willing to bet that if he had, most people who understand football and footballers would have agreed that those instincts were bang on.
I didn’t see a shred of intent in Watt’s actions. There’s no aggression in his body language, no malice in his expression, no guilty grimace as he realises what he’s done.
If we’re saying this was a dangerous challenge or violent conduct or any of those weasel-word descriptions, then the game’s a bogey.
Infuriatingly, though, the most controversial call from Scotland’s second weekend in the shadow of nuisance technology is just what comes with this new level of nit-pickery.
Matchdays are no longer about playing to the whistle, about the referee’s decision being final or so many other basics we grew up understanding; no, matchdays are now about some itchy- trigger-fingered, time-and-motion, health-and-safety jobsworth getting a slide rule out to find ways of spoiling everyone’s entertainment.
We might never see a better — or should that be worse? — example of this than the goal-that-wasn’t from PSV wonderkid Xavi Simons against Arsenal on Thursday night.
He beats one, he beats two, he beats three, he beats four, he flicks it past the keeper.
It’s a thing of beauty, a moment you could frame and hang in the Louvre, maybe even the greatest thing he’ll ever do in his career.
But it ends up counting for nothing, because in the build-up a colleague is leaning the wrong side of the last defender before he touches the ball into the scorer’s path.
No one noticed, no one claimed — and, most importantly, no one would have blinked an eyelid had VAR not got involved.
It did get involved, though. And even though the decision was technically right, as it had been with the disallowed Harry Kane goal for Spurs against Sporting Lisbon two nights before, it offered absolutely no positive input to the game.
To be fair, that’s not the fault of VAR in itself.
What it throws into the sharpest of relief is how unfit for purpose the current offside law is, just as a whole raft of penalty incidents continue to show how unfit for purpose the current handball law is.
On offside, every time a goal bites the dust because of an oxter, a toenail or a nose-hair, we’re told that “the forward has gone too early”.
But what happened to the forward being given the benefit of the doubt, as was the case before we turned football into FIFA ’23? Why aren’t defenders ever punished for going too late?
That thought struck me at Easter Road on Saturday, when Hibs had a brilliant early effort chalked off for an offside where the attacker was doing no more than what he’s meant to do — thinking faster than his marker.
Joe Newell’s perfect pass bisects two defenders beautifully, Marijan Cabraja’s run and cross are pinpoint and Mykola Kuharevich’s sliding finish is clinical.
Even as someone who dreads seeing St Mirren ship goals, my only thought was how well we’d been opened up and what a cracker it was.
Had Cabraja or Kuharevich been looking along the line, if they could see they were standing in an offside position and were simply too lazy to get back, then hell mend them.
But if what we’re saying is that VAR’s there to protect defenders whose positioning and reactions are sloppy, then we might as well pull the shutters down.
So what’s to be done about this mess? Last week I called for the clock to stop whenever a VAR decision is being made and here’s another pair of pleas to those who write the rules.
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It’s for offside not to come into play unless there’s clear daylight between attacker and defenders - and for handball only count if it’s clearly and obviously deliberate. Because if not? Well, we’ve all seen it.
The guys in the studio are taking over. And they’re sucking the life out of the game we love.
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