Peter Lawwell should have issued Celtic apology for crass banner and if it was Beale's name he would have - Hugh Keevins

Scottish football has spent the last week arguing over whether doing the right thing is the right thing to do.

It’s contrary and complex – even by the standards of our narrow-minded, inward- looking world of melodrama. The thought was prompted by the first caller to the radio to get involved in the rights and wrongs of Rangers’ manager Michael Beale ordering his players to let Partick Thistle score an equaliser in Sunday’s Scottish Cup tie at Ibrox.

In that instant, Beale, for me, showed a high degree of integrity and a remarkable presence of mind amidst a game in which his side were giving, by his own admission, a “lousy” performance. The caller, however, described the manager’s instruction to conceded a goal as a “disgrace” – but only after he had begun his complaint by saying: “I’m not into this integrity”. Fans in general aren’t that big on scruples. If there is a danger of scruples leading to a defeat for their team then they are actively opposed to the very idea of scruples.

I was immediately reminded of the Rangers fan I had spoken to during another phone-in last August after Celtic had taken nine goals off Dundee United at Tannadice. He felt that, on a matter of principle, Ange Postecoglou’s team should have stopped scoring after their fourth goal out of sympathy for the opposition who were being so clearly outclassed. Scruples would therefore appear to be a results-driven business in the eyes of some supporters.

The insistence that integrity was a dubious characteristic, particularly for a football manager, was aired in public in the aftermath of another breathtaking moment during Celtic’s cup win over St Mirren. A banner was unfurled during a break in play that described assistant referee Douglas Ross as a