{"id":426298,"date":"2026-02-15T01:46:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-15T01:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/426298\/"},"modified":"2026-02-15T01:46:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-15T01:46:07","slug":"referee-that-neil-lennon-called-out-handed-crucial-celtic-clash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/426298\/","title":{"rendered":"Referee that Neil Lennon called out handed crucial Celtic clash"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Celtic travel to Ayrshire to face Kilmarnock in what could be a pivotal day in the Scottish Premiership title race. In a double header, Martin O\u2019Neill\u2019s side take on Killie while Hearts travel to Ibrox to take on Rangers. <\/p>\n<p>Celtic need to put pressure on both Hearts and Rangers by putting 11th placed Killie to the sword; however, it will be a tough game as it often is at Rugby Park. <\/p>\n<p>The SFA have confirmed the appointment of referee Duncan Nicolson for the clash at Rugby Park. <\/p>\n<p>Nicholson has taken charge of one Celtic game this season, a 1-0 win over Dundee before Martin O\u2019Neill made way for Wilfried Nancy\u2019s disastrous spell. <\/p>\n<p>Scott Anderson and Alastair Taylor will assist Nicolson. <\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Greg Aitken is on VAR at Clydesdale House with Chris Graham assisting. <\/p>\n<p>Nicolson may not be the most notable referee but he was recently heavily criticised by Celtic legend Neil Lennon. The Irishman criticised the whistleblower to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sport\/football\/live\/czjpn89711yt#player\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the BBC<\/a> after a poor display in Dunfermline\u2019s game against Ross County back in October. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI haven\u2019t been this angry with the officials for a long, long time.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd even at the end I\u2019ve had to go into his office and speak about the way the assistant linesman made disparaging comments to one of my coaching staff.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf this is the level we are getting to we are in trouble.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are getting done by referees and particularly that one.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve already asked the head of referees \u2013 I don\u2019t want him refereeing any of our games again.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s either incompetent or I don\u2019t know what the word I\u2019m looking for is\u2026<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ll leave to the club to report back to Willie. I\u2019ve been in the game a long time and that attitude from a certain individual is unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Celtic travel to Ayrshire to face Kilmarnock in what could be a pivotal day in the Scottish Premiership&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":426299,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[218,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-426298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-football","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426298\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/426299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}