Celtic’s Scott Sinclair’s League Cup final win was tainted over accusations of diving.
Celtic’s Scott Sinclair came in for widespread criticism on Sunday for his perceived theatrics in the 2-0 League Cup final win over Motherwell at Hampden Park.
The former Aston Villa man went down in the box under a slight tug from Cedric Kipre, who was sent off and Moussa Dembele despatched the resulting penalty to double the Hoops’ lead.
Replays show that the decision to award the penalty was extremely soft and the Celtic attacker has since been accused of diving by Chris Suttong among others.
Bhoys boss Brendan Rodgers stood behind his man, claiming referee Craig Thomson got it right, but speaking to The National, has goalkeeper Craig Gordon admitted that he did dive?
“I just seen it outside and it is the first time I have seen it. What I would say about Scotty is that he doesn’t go down that easily at all,” Gordon told The National.
“He is a goalscorer, he wants to score and if he has the opportunity to score a goal he normally tries to stay on his feet to score.”
Gordon’s use of the word “normally” suggests that the 28-year-old did not try to stay on his feet on that occasion.
The subject of diving has been heavily debated down South over the past week or so after Everton’s Oumar Niasse was hit with a two-match ban for “exaggerating the effect of a normal contact to deceive the referee”.
Few would argue that the Celtic man isn’t guilty of doing the same thing.
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