The Hearts manager took a thinly-veiled swipe at the Hoops red card record following Trusty’s dismissal
Former Celtic star Peter Grant urged the SFA to summon Derek McInnes to Hampden after his dig over Auston Trusty’s red card at Tynecastle.
However, the Hearts boss demonstrated he doesn’t discriminate when it comes to taking a jab at perceived bias from officials.
That’s because McInnes, two years ago, made a similar remark about Rangers after they conceded a rare penalty against his Kilmarnock side.
Trailing 2-0 at the time during the fixture on January 2, 2024, McInnes celebrated on the touchline when John Souttar was judged to have handled the ball in the box and Daniel Armstrong stepped up to convert the resulting penalty. The spot-kick ended a remarkable sequence of 74 games without Rangers conceding a penalty in the league.
‘Penalty to Rangers’ had become a humorous catchphrase among some Scottish football supporters, but the scarcity of spot-kicks against the Ibrox team also sparked conspiracy theories on the other side of Glasgow and beyond.
And that was something a grinning McInnes alluded to after that match as he said he was ‘delighted’ just to earn a penalty. He said at the time: “We’re just delighted to get a penalty, and who’d have thought at Ibrox! It’s good to get one back, and it was game on.”
Ironically, John Beaton was the referee in Govan that day and awarded the penalty on the advice of VAR Andrew Dallas. On Sunday, Beaton was again in charge at Clydesdale House and advised Steven McLean to review a challenge by Trusty, which then led to a red card.
The USA goalkeeper’s dismissal was the first the club has endured domestically in almost two years, since Yang was sent off at the same venue in March 2024.
And McInnes remarked: “Celtic don’t get red cards domestically. It was a bit of a shock when VAR turned it and made it a red.”
Ex-Hoops midfielder Grant criticised McInnes, accusing him of attempting to influence officials and challenging him to provide instances where Celtic should have had a player sent off. He said: “That’s ridiculous. The SFA should look at that because that’s trying to put pressure on referees for me. I’d like Derek to say where Celtic should have got a red card any time this season.