Graeme Shinnie's Aberdeen ban could put £5million at risk as former Don slams SFA lack of common sense

Steve Tosh works for Red TV but the former Aberdeen midfielder is adamant it’s not blind bias that has him scratching his head over the additional one match handed to Dons skipper Graeme Shinnie by the SFA.

It’s just utter disbelief that the independent appeals tribunal set up to consider Aberdeen ’s defence of the man, who was red carded in Dingwall on Friday night, was deemed to be frivolous with no chance of success, so his punishment was upped from three matches to four.

Tosh watched the match, and while he was unsurprised that Aberdeen lost their appeal, he was gobsmacked at the decision to heap an additional ban onto the Pittodrie skipper, who will now be out until the second last game of the season as his club chases a European bounty that could be worth up to £5m to them. He said: “I didn’t think they would overturn the decision. That would have made them look daft, particularly as it was a VAR job.

“But the fact is that the referee was five yards away from the challenge and didn’t even deem it to be a foul. The assistant ref and the fourth official were each within 15 yards of it, looking at it from different angles and didn’t think it was a foul.

“It’s only when VAR gets involved and everything gets slowed down, that it looks so much worse. You see that in the boxing when someone gets hit with a jab and it doesn’t look much, then in slow motion you see the guy’s face contorting. So, when VAR intervened I feared the worst for Shinnie.

“Look, he’s a totally committed player, but so was the Ross County player (Jack Baldwin). When Shinnie wins the ball, where else can his leg go but through to connect with his opponent?

“The laws of the game might deem it be a red card, but there’s enough doubt there to