One rule for Neil Lennon, another for the rest

One rule for Neil Lennon, another for the rest.

Phil Gordon - The Times - March 27 2012

He is always the one, isn’t he? That Neil Lennon. If the Celtic manager was starting to entertain thoughts that he might be an ordinary man, the last few days will have delivered an uncomfortable truth. Lennon is unique, but not in a good way.

When you start measuring your experience with match officials, and the subsequent fallout with the Scottish Football Association, with that of your counterparts, the evidence will offer reasonable doubt. If Lennon was just an ordinary man, he would not have spent the second half of Sunday’s Old Firm game watching events in the media room at Ibrox — regardless of who advised him to go there.

Lennon must have been the only manager in the history of British football to be condemned to spend 45 minutes in a locked room after being “sent off” at half-time by the referee. Even players who have been sent off, and head to the dressing room, can get showered and changed to watch the rest of the match from the stand, but not Lennon.

Even if Calum Murray’s view is that Lennon broke the rules, and the Celtic manager will certainly contest that on the basis of what he said at the press conference after the Old Firm encounter when he revealed his “confinement” during the second 45 minutes, the inescapable verdict is that Lennon has been denied basic human rights, never mind the managerial right to sit in the stand and watch the second half.

Celtic revealed yesterday that it was their security people who advised Lennon that he could not sit in the Ibrox directors’ box, and Rangers confirmed that they had offered Lennon a seat there after Murray’s sanction against the Celtic manager. However, what security adviser worth his salt would not have come to the same conclusion?

This is the man who was attacked by a Heart of Midlothian fan last May while doing his job on the touchline. He is also the man who has been giving evidence in the case of two men accused of plotting to kill him. So, sitting up there in the directors’ box, in a stadium where his name is abused even when Celtic are not there, is hardly an option.

Except that it should be. Lennon is entitled to the same treatment that every manager takes for granted. Stuart McCall, the Motherwell manager, is actually facing the same charge as Lennon — alleged breach of rule 203 — for the same “crime” as Lennon, criticising Craig Thomson, the referee, during the recent Scottish Cup defeat by Aberdeen at Fir Park.

The difference between McCall’s case and that of Lennon is that the Motherwell manager was able to sit up in the directors’ box at Fir Park to watch the second half after being “sent off” at half-time in similar manner to his Celtic counterpart.

McCall has rejected the SFA’s offer of a one-match ban and will be visiting Hampden Park for his day in “court” around the same time as Lennon.

If Lennon did not know that he was in a special category of one, it was brought home to him during the Scottish Communities League Cup semi-final with Falkirk. A manager strode out on to the Hampden turf and jabbed an accusing finger at Euan Norris, the referee. It was Steven Pressley, Lennon’s counterpart.
The Falkirk manager was also “sent off” by Norris. Undaunted, Pressley went out for the second half and actually found a seat in the press box at the national stadium and sat alongside journalists.

Pressley received a four-game ban for his very public act. Last year, Lennon had to use a lawyer to have a much larger ban reduced to four games. Where is the consistency?

Lennon is not the first manager in the world to be sent off. When it happens during the game, luminaries such as Arsène Wenger have found a seat in the hostile heartlands of Old Trafford, while David Moyes, of Everton, climbed into the spectators’ area at Stoke City.

However, the fact that Lennon is regarded as such a security risk when a referee hands out some summary justice should put this country to shame.

Lennon might want to seek advice from another manager who had a bad day at work, once. He too saw his team reduced to nine men, and he too felt the referee’s judgment to be so flawed that he ignored the fines and took the SFA to court to overturn a touchline ban that “affected his ability to carry out his duties as a manager”.

That man was Craig Levein, while in charge of Heart of Midlothian in 2003. It certainly never stopped Levein in his tracks; he is now Scotland manager.

Levein has an office at Hampden. Maybe Lennon should pop up for tea next time he’s in the building.