Tam McManus calls for major VAR change and handball rule rewritten after Celtic and Partick Thistle penalty shockers

Two Scottish Cup ties went ahead with VAR and five without at the weekend. And no prizes for guessing where all the controversy, shock and outright horror lay.

Listen, this is not going to be a rant about referees. Far from it. I tried picking up a whistle a few years ago and lasted five minutes. More about that later. But something needs to be done to stop the endless arguments that VAR seems to create which are taking away from the time spent talking about our brilliant product in Scotland and the talent we have here.

And 99 per cent of those debates surround handball decisions. There’s a simple solution for me. Don’t let VAR get involved in handball. Add it to the list of decisions that the video refs can’t push the button on. Once a ref gives or doesn’t give a penalty then get on with it. It’s when officials are called to the screen and start looking at ball to hand scenarios umpteen times that a can of worms is suddenly opened. Is the arm in an unnatural position? Is it a clear and obvious error? Was the ball going on target? The Celtic and Partick Thistle penalties at the weekend were just the latest where the handball rule is causing bother rather than eradicating it. VAR was at the centre of both awards.

I was surprised when David Munro was called to the monitor at Ibrox and even more shocked when he awarded the spot kick for Thistle. Antonio Colak wasn’t even looking at the ball when it hit his hand from just a yard away. We’ve seen them given before but in other games similar ones have gone unpunished. Look at Kye Rowles’ one for Hearts against St Mirren which I reckon was far more clear a penalty than those two at the weekend.

None of those penalty kicks were awarded by the on-field ref until VAR got involved.