Celtic take action against Sky Sports after Morelos scandal

After Sky Sports mistranslated Alfredo Morelos’ interview, making it look like the Colombian was accusing Celtic fans of racism, the club have taken strict action.

Earlier in the season, claims floated around in the media that Alfredo Morelos was racially abused by Celtic fans after the club lost for the first time at Parkhead against the Rangers since 2010. And while nothing has been proved yet, a 12-year-old boy was arrested yesterday by the police for allegedly being involved!

An Alfredo Morelos interview that came out in the midst of all this though managed to create huge controversy. While the Colombian spoke in Spanish, there were subtitles in the video for the understanding of English speakers.

As it turns out though, the translation was wildly inaccurate. While the subtitles had made it seem like Morelos was accusing the Hoops fans of racially abusing him at Parkhead, in reality he said nothing of the sort.

Spanish speakers were quick to notice the difference between what was being actually being said and the subtitles being provided. As a result, Sky Sports were left red-faced and forced to take down the interview. And it is absolutely baffling how a network with the reputation of Sky could make such an error.

Later on they posted a different version of the interview and released a statement regarding the matter:

"“After numerous steps undertaken by Sky to verify the interview thoroughly we can be clear that at no point did Morelos allege that any racial abuse was directed at him by Celtic supporters in the interview. We apologise to the supporters of Celtic football club for this serious error. We are reviewing our procedures for translated interviews to ensure this does not occur in future.”"

There has surprisingly not been many complaints coming out of Ibrox regarding the matter, despite their star striker being mistranslated by a major network. Celtic have certainly not taken the matter lightly though.

As reported by The Guardian, the club have refused to co-operate with Sky Sports. Reporters from the broadcaster have not present at Celtic’s last two pre-match press conferences.

This becomes even more significant because of the fact that next Sky will be entering the first year of an exclusive five-year deal to screen live Scottish Premiership games.