Scott Brown in no mood to forgive referee McDonald

Straight talking Scott Brown is in no mood to forgive and forget referee Dougie McDonald.

Brown was red carded by McDonald at Ibrox last month and will come face to face with the whistler when he returns to captain Celtic against Kilmarnock today.

Unlike the Wayne Bridge/John Terry incident there will be no avoiding the handshake before the kick-off but Brown won't be letting the events at Ibrox slip into the past.

Asked about McDonald's performance at Ibrox ahead of today's 'reunion' Brown said: "Hopefully he'll do his job better this time than he did the last time. Is this a test of my patience? I think so."

Most people who viewed the incident between Brown and Kyle Lafferty felt that both players were equally guilty and that the incident was worth a yellow card each.

Dougie McDonald isn't most people.

The man who allowed Madjid Bougherra license to kick Robbie Keane throughtout the match despite issuing an early yellow card had tunnel vision in the Brown incident as he raced to flash a red card at the Celtic midfielder.

Within three hours of the game ending Celtic had put in an appeal against the red card with McDonald predicatably rejecting the appeal.

The referee's attitude to the incident and appeal clearly bothers Brown who added: "If the referee had seen it properly, hadn't made his mind up early doors, actually spoken to his linesman, he could have got the decision right.

"But as it happens, he didn't even want to review it, he didn't even want to look at the evidence.

"I'm just a little bit disappointed he can't look at video evidence and actually know I haven't full-out grabbed Lafferty and head-butted him as he says I have.

"I think it's embarrassing that the referee is left to review his own decision.

"It doesn't matter what happens - it's coming back to him anyway. He's not going to change his mind and show he's wrong."

Despite the leaks flowing out of the SFA they have yet to charge Celtic for the website statement that openly criticised McDonald's performance at Ibrox.

Similarly Aiden McGeady hasn't been asked to explain why he said that he felt McDonald's performance at Ibrox wasn't impartial.

The silence of the SFA suggests that they are on unsteady ground and are scared to take Celtic up on their criticisms of McDonald that day.

As he prepares for today's match McDonald will no doubt be enjoying the focus and attention that he will come under at Celtic Park.

Refereeing in the same dramatic manner as his mentor Hugh Dallas anything is possible in this afternoon's match from the man that has refereed three Rangers games in the last five weeks and been criticised by Dundee United's Peter Houston over honest mistakes that presented Rangers with two penalties after going a goal behind to Dundee United.

Should McDonald continue his recent poor performances he can expect further criticism from Celtic.

Whether the SFA have the courage to challenge the club's comments and back their official remains to be seen.

Davie Provan's verdict on Tony Mowbray

Davie Provan believes that last night's defeat from St Mirren was Tony Mowbray's Caley Thistle moment.

Mowbray's brief Celtic career is strangely familiar to that of Barnes with neither men able to adapt to the demands of managing the club or capable of surviving a full season.

The axe fell on Mowbray in mid-afternoon with Provan expecting the inevitable after last night's disastrous result against St Mirren.

He told Sky Sports: "The St Mirren result last night was to Tony Mowbray what the Caley Thistle result was to John Barnes ten years ago. In many respects last night was the straw that broke the camel's back. 

"Last night's result was symptomatic of how Celtic have been set up under Tony. He's brought some very decent attacking players to the club from midfield forward, they have been easy on the eye, the arrival of Robbie Keane in particular has been terrific for supporters to go and watch.

"But he has never really addressed the defence and as recently as the last Old Firm game at Ibrox which they lost Celtic found themselves where they had two teenage centre-backs going into that game.

"At a time when a more experienced centre back, Stephen McManus, who was club captain as recently as last season, was down on loan at Middlesbrough.

"In my opinion I don't think that Tony got it right at the back. Many of us have great respect for the way that he wanted to see the game played.

"He arrived with a very specific football ideology but if you can't translate that into results and points then you are not going to last in Glasgow, that's the way that this has panned out.

"There is no surprise that Celtic have taken the action that they have- now it's a matter of where they go from here."

Neil Lennon's appointment as caretaker was the obvious choice for the club to make with steering the team to success in the Scottish Cup the target.

Longer term the board face the difficult task of appointing the next manager for a job that no longer carries the appeal that it once did.

While managing Celtic still has obvious attractions the £1m+-a-year deals available for managing in the Premiership are hard to compete with.

Recent appointments have all come from England but Provan believes that finding a candidate with sufficient stature to make a success of the job won't be easy.

He added: "It's fair to say that the job does not at the moment hold the type of appeal that it had when Martin O'Neill came to Glasgow.

"As recently as this summer both Owen Coyle and Roberto Martinez were approached to come to Celtic Park and neither wanted to take up the challenge.

"It's going to be very difficult for Celtic to identify a top class manager to fill Tony Mowbray's decision.

"I don't think that Neil (Lennon) will be a serious candidate for the job in the long term although I would hope that he could become part of the coaching staff on going.

"Celtic have time on their side but they don't want to leave it too long, you have to remember that they are likely to be playing Champions League qualifiers before the end of July.

"They shouldn't leave it too long. They have to identify somebody in the reasonable short term, let that person know what their budget is so that they can go and identfify players for the summer months.

"That's when Peter Lawwell has to do his job and get the players that the new man will identify to give him a chance to hit the ground running ahead of those Champions League qualifiers."

Cup misery for McStay and Ujpest

Willie McStay had an even more miserable time than most Celtic fans last night as Ujpest Dozsa lost 1-0 at home to ZTE in the first leg of their Magyar Cup Semi Final.

A last minute goal from Balazas capped off a bad night for the home side who have been unable to recapture the form that they showed before the winter break.

Beating league leaders Videoton home and away in the quarter finals earned Ujpest their semi-final place but McStay is still hopeful of turning the semi-final around.

He said: "It was a bad night allround, we had a player sent off then lost a last minute goal.

"I can't fault my players efforts in any way, they are giving me everything but not much is going our way just now.

"We're working as hard as we can with a small squad but when we are down a couple of players it makes things very difficult.

"I've still got faith in the players, they have had a great season and showed with their wins over Videoton and Debrecen that they are as good as anyone in the country.

"We'll have to lift ourselves for the league at the weekend before we can think about the return match with ZTE.

"We're still in the cup and given the breaks more than capable of winning the return leg and reaching the final."

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Frail's joy with Spence scoring run

Youth boss Stevie Frail was delighted with his side's 2-1 win over high flying Motherwell at Bathgate earlier today.

The SPL u-19's is a a fiercely contested division with a run of four straight wins putting Motherwell in contention for the title.

A double from Greig Spence, taking his tally to five in three games, was enough to give Celtic the points ahead of two crucial games against Livingston in the SFA Youth Cup and Rangers in the league.

"It was an excellent result for us today," Frail admitted. "Motherwell are strong at this level, they had a few lads who've featured in their first team and they've been in good form recently.

"We were well prepared for the match, the players put everything into the game and got their reward. It would have been nice to record a clean sheet but the result was important.

"Everyone is looking forward now to playing Livingston at Celtic Park in the cup, we're hoping to progress into the final and that will give them confidence for the league game with Rangers."

After losing 2-1 to Rangers Frail's side have responded with three back to back wins thanks largely to the goalscoring run of Spence.

The striker was left out for the Rangers game but has bounced back from that decision to show the form that earned him his early season transfer from Alloa.

Frail added: "We discussed with Greig why he was left out against Rangers and he's came back stronger.

"He's upto 12 goals now for the season and is one of the top scorers in the division.

"He's working hard on his game and is putting the chances away.

"The team is playing well as a unit, we're getting a few players back from injury as well as younger ones coming into contention from the u-17 side.

"Callum McGregor scored twice for the 17s on Sunday and came into our side today and didn't look out of place."

SPL u-19 league table

McManus: No prizes for bravery

Stephen McManus ought to know that no medals, or contracts are handed out in football for bravery.

Over the last two years his performances have dipped alongside his fitness, there's little doubt that it's been a long time since he's enjoyed full fitness.

Playing through the pain barrier is a mugs game on two fronts- it aggravates injuries and effects form with McManus the perfect example.

Various injuries prevented the centre half from building on the early successes of his Celtic career which earned him the club captaincy.

After missing out on the start of the season at Celtic he moved on loan to Middlesbrough in January where he has so far made nine appearances.

Automatic promotion is a write-off for Gordon Strachan's side but the play-off's remain a realistic target for a dozen inconsistent Championship sides.

Beating Preston at the Riverside tomorrow night is essential if 'Boro are to build any momentum with Mick typically anxious to be involved after missing Saturday's draw with Reading.

"He was desperate to play,” 'Boro coach Colin Copper admitted. "But the gaffer took a look at him and felt it was too much of a risk.

“You’ve got to be able to keep going for 90 minutes but Mick clearly wasn’t well.

“We’ll hope that it is just a 24-hour thing. We will see how he goes in training.”

 Football is littered with players who felt that they could play through injuries, and also littered with those that call off injured at the slightest knock.

There are examples everywhere of players who thought that they knew best or did it for the team only to find themselves eventually discarded or sidelined.

Whether his future is at Celtic or elsewhere the remaining months of the season should be about regaining form and confidence for Mick- he's did enough soldiering on for the cause and has nothing to prove to anyone in terms of bravery.