A cover up at Hampden Park

Even now as I look at that title, I think to myself that this resembles a spy flick more than reality. That it represents the staple behaviour of a communist regime rather than the democracy Scotland is supposed to be.

But the reality is that while some journalists and authorities have conceded (to some extent anyway) the sickening events of Saturday evening at Hampden, the majority have outright denied it, or, even worse in the embarrassing case of Rod Petrie, refused to condemn it.

Rangers issued the finest statement they have for many a year when they held Scottish football and society to account for its role in the fiasco – there is no one who would deny Rangers fans were also involved in the fracas – there are plenty of videos showing the extent.

But the truth is something a lot uglier – that the Hibernian ‘fans’, assaulting Rangers players and staff and threatening, fighting and goading Rangers supporters, have been either supported by the rest of Scottish football, or have been completely acquitted of any wrong doing at all.

According to some sections of the Scottish press, such as the Sun, Rangers fans were the guilty ones – that joyous Hibs supporters in elation ran the pitch, and those bad Rangers fans attacked them. According to First Minister Kim Jo…sorry, Nicola Sturgeon, absolutely nothing happened at Hampden and Hibernian should be congratulated for their triumph.

On a football level, I would reluctantly accept this; they were by far the better team and deserved their win. But for the country’s ‘leader’ to whitewash a riot of that nature and refuse to condemn the actions of Easter Road’s finest?

Then we have the football authorities. The SFA released a watery statement after the match, but did not have the basic decency to send an official into Rangers’ dressing room following the players’ understandable refusal to return back out to the pitch to receive their runners’ up medals. Instead the cowards sent Ryan Hardie in with them.

And one of their board members? Rod Petrie not only barely condemned Hibs fans at all, but effectively denied any of the malice in the actions. He refused to call their behaviour ‘disgraceful’, settling instead for ‘unacceptable’. And even then, he only referred to the pitch invasion. The assaults? He denied any took place.

A Daily Record source claims at least XI Rangers players were either spat on, punched or kicked in some way – in other words, every player in the team. This is not inconceivable.

And the BBC? They barely mentioned it at all. Jane Lewis, once of STV, has become well and truly a BBC puppet by goading Rangers fans on Twitter with a jest about how she was missing the ‘Hibsedit’ retweets.

The direction Scottish society is now going in is worrying. An attack took place in Edinburgh where a Rangers fan was knocked unconscious by at least three Hibernian supporters, and another in Govan where an elderly gentleman of at round 80 years of age was mugged and beaten near the Salvation Army hostel Saturday evening. The latter might not have been related to the chaos, but the timing was certainly suspect.

The most worrying part is the Scottish media’s refusal to actually outright condemn what Hibernian fans did. Just like they refused with Motherwell last year. No words from official broadcast channels condemning anything; but plenty in 2008 when a number of Rangers fans wreaked havoc in England. Barely any either when Celtic fans disgraced themselves in Zagreb for the umpteenth time.

But the narrative is just different when it involves Rangers.

And that is deeply worrying.