Their supporters have infected forums everywhere wishing injury on Eduardo. Quite frankly I found the whole episode quite therapeutic as, let’s not mince our words, Celtic have been cheating for years and they quite simply deserve everything they get.
The likes of McDonald ( there is a great photo doing the rounds on FF of his dive near Whittaker), Larsson, Petrov, Sutton and Moravcik to name but a few have polluted the Scottish game for years without punishment.
Indeed, ex-forward and now pundit Andy Walker has commented that he regularly dived to gain an advantage whilst playing for Celtic: now imagine my shock when he roundly condemned Eduardo! Karma, you have to love it.
Fast forward to Sunday’s match at Easter Road and low and behold, would you believe it, one of Celtic’s players has cheated again. This time it's McGeady, and credit to the referee he was booked for diving and ultimately shown a red card. I salute the referee because McGeady has been getting away with it for years, so to have the bravery to produce a red whilst he must know deep inside the pressure the Celtic officials would put on him, showed a rare level of bottle.
Unsurprisingly this pressure was not far away at all.
Caldwell and Mowbray were quickly out, refusing to look at replays and launching a staunch defence of McGeady which makes them look nothing but pathetic and stupid. The Scottish sporting press must have released a collective ‘oh no’ as the red card was produced, they now must tackle a situation with Celtic they have dodged for years. I await with interest their reporting of this incident (they certainly didn’t and haven't held back against Lafferty have they?) so we are right to expect the same equality of reporting with this.
Speaking of the SFA, they have set somewhat of a precedent for this. Kyle Lafferty was rightly punished by both club and governing body, earning a two match ban. Surely equality must strike here and this become an equal punishment for McGeady too? Let's face it, Gordon Smith has been shouting from the rooftops all week about Eduardo shaming football; well Gordon, now it’s right on your doorstep, what are you going to do?
Celtic will of course act in a way they always have, indeed Mowbray and Caldwell have already displayed this. They will lie, deflect and defend the indefensible. Some of you out there may think at least they defend and fight for their players, fans etc, and Rangers don’t do that, but I ask you: would you not rather your Club acted with a shred of decency and integrity instead of a blatant lack of it as Celtic do time and time again?
Look at the recent Loovens vs. Edu situation. This is a blatant as it comes and by appealing the ban thrown down to him, Celtic have displayed everything I have commented on above. The SFA - if it had any sense of governance about them - should hammer the player and Celtic further with regards to a blatant waste of time, because there is no defending this incident. Yet still, unashamedly, they have tried to defend a player who tried to seriously injure another.
We are only three weeks into the season and already it is clear that it same old Celtic: always cheating, always moaning and forever hypocritical.