Irish referees to answer Scotland’s call

In the wake of the decision by Category One referees in Scotland to go on strike, the Scottish Football Association (SFA) have confirmed that they may look to Ireland for help.

Should they agree to help out their Celtic cousins, the cream of Irish referees can expect shouts of ‘Ach, ‘twas never a free ref, aye’ and other such abuse from players in the Scottish Premier League (SPL) from this weekend.

How Rangers fans will react to the prospect of Irish referees officiating at Celtic games remains to be seen, but SFA chief executive Stewart Regan has revealed that the contingency plans should the matter not be resolved involves calling on referees from Ireland as well as Scandinavia.

“We've got to make sure we bring in referees from those countries who are available,” he told radio station talkSPORT.

“It could be the Republic of Ireland, it could be the Scandinavian countries, there are a number of options open to us and we will be exhausting all of those.

“There will be a cost; it will be expensive bringing people in, not just match fees but the expense of getting them here as well.

“It affects 20 matches, a huge number of matches to cover and we sympathise with the referees because they've had a tough few weeks and they have been under massive scrutiny with challenges to their integrity.

”There has even been one MP coming out saying referees should declare their allegiances before matches which seemed a very bizarre request and quite frankly I think they have had enough.

“We have talks scheduled for the next few days but clearly with a contract to be fulfilled with the Scottish Premier League we have to put a contingency plan in and that's what we are doing at the moment by looking elsewhere for officials.”