The Scottish Football Association has released a statement confirming that an independent review will be conducted into the events that followed the Scottish Cup quarter-final between Rangers and Celtic at Ibrox last Sunday.
The match ended with Celtic winning on penalties, triggering a pitch invasion from a section of the travelling support. A group of Rangers fans, many of them masked, then charged across the stadium in response, leading to violent clashes that shocked Scottish football and drew widespread condemnation from figures across the game.
In its statement, the SFA confirmed that the Compliance Officer is gathering evidence from the match and that any alleged breaches of rules will be communicated to the relevant parties through the Judicial Panel Protocol. The governing body also confirmed it will commission an independent review of the matchday safety and security operation for the fixture, with the aim of producing recommendations to ensure the scenes are not repeated.
The game had been the first Glasgow derby to feature a full 7,500 away allocation in eight years, made possible by Scottish Cup regulations entitling Celtic to request 20 per cent of the Ibrox capacity. In the Premiership, away allocations for derby matches had only recently been raised to 3,000 after a prolonged period in which visiting supporters were effectively excluded. Given what happened on Sunday, a return to maximum allocations in the near future now looks highly unlikely.
The fallout has been significant. The Celtic Fans Collective released a detailed statement criticising the police operation before, during and after the match. Simon Jordan raised similar questions about the management of the event and pointed to declining funding for police operations at major matches in Scotland. In response, both the Chief Constable and Deputy Chief Constable defended the force, with the Chief Constable also criticising both clubs for their continued silence on the conduct of their supporters.