Davie Provan blasts Kris Boyd’s ridiculous comments

Davie Provan has blasted Kris Boyd for his ridiculous Celtic points reduction comments because of Boli Bolingoli’s disastrous trip to Spain.

First of all, let us just say that there is no excuse for Boli Bolingoli’s decision to secretly go to Spain without informing the club and then coming back to play against Kilmarnock instead of quarantining like he was supposed to do so. He should definitely be punished for that and might have even ended up destroying his future at Celtic, although that was already under question following a season of inconsistent performances.

His actions though should not get the entire club into trouble. Celtic’s two games getting postponed is more than enough punishment considering the fact that they had no knowledge of the situation. This opens up the opportunity for other clubs to rack up points and pile the pressure on the defending champions, who are already going for 10IAR and the historical pressure that comes with it.

Calls have been made from all around Scotland though for Celtic to get points docked. Now, we don’t need to tell you that which camp is making the most noise about it. Let us just say that it is no surprised that Kris Boyd is very open to the idea of the Hoops getting docked as much as six points. He wrote in The Scottish Sun:

"“The SPFL have made it crystal clear that they don’t have free dates for postponed fixtures, that they face a major headache rearranging matches. Well, don’t rearrange them.“Award the points to Killie and St Mirren and cancel the Celtic against Aberdeen match. Problem solved.“Aberdeen should also be forfeiting the points up for grabs for their other games against St Johnstone and Hamilton Accies.“I don’t think they could have any right to complain.”"

And although Boyd does claim in the article that he would say the same thing if this was the Rangers, we do not remember him raising many issues when the Rangers decided to field multiple untested players in a friendly game merely weeks ago.

Thankfully, Davie Provan has called out Boyd for his claims and decided to provide a more realistic solution to this situation. In his own column in The Scottish Sun, he wrote:

"“The suggestion clubs should forfeit points if they’re responsible for a game being called off is daft. Why would you punish players who are following the guidelines because of one who can’t?“St Mirren boss Jim Goodwin had a better solution. A lengthy suspension for guilty individuals makes more sense. If a player deliberately ignores the Covid-19 restrictions, he should be fined and banned.“That possibility must terrify Neil Doncaster. With Sturgeon threatening a red card, the game is on a knife-edge. Halting the season now would make last season’s shambles resemble a picnic.”"

This is a much better solution than just docking clubs points. To be very honest, there is nothing that either club could have done about this situation. It is not possible for them to have an eye on the players 24 hours on the day. Individuals have to take responsibility for their own actions and in this case, it must be the nine players who bear the punishment and not their clubs.