Rangers call for Collum talks after ref chief backs Trusty decision

Celtic's Auston Trusty followed through on Rangers' Jack Butland

Rangers have called for further talks with Willie Collum after the Scottish FA's head of referees backed his match officials over the decision not to show a red card to Celtic's Auston Trusty in the Ibrox side's Premier Sports Cup semi-final defeat.

They had written to the SFA to request an explanation as they believed referee Nick Walsh should have shown more than a yellow card to the centre-half for his challenge on goalkeeper Jack Butland at Hampden last month.

The SFA's independent key match incident (KMI) panel last week agreed by a majority of two to one that Trusty should have been sent off.

But Collum told the Scottish Football VAR Review: "We can support the yellow card here, but it is also important to say there is a subjective element to this decision and we fully respect people's opinion if they think that's a red card."

He admitted that "15 years ago, this is a red" card but pointed out that the incident was viewed as "violent conduct" rather than "serious foul play" under current rules.

"The goalkeeper is in possession of the ball when the contact is made, so we don't regard this as a challenge for the ball," Collum explained.

Walsh and the video assistant referee (VAR) team then had to decide "whether excessive force" was used.

"The referee comes to the conclusion there's not enough force, it is not brutality for him and the contact is negligible," Collum said.

He said this was clear from the recording of the onfield communication between Walsh and the VAR team.

"You immediately hear him say reckless yellow and then he's in a long conversation with the captain of Rangers, but at that point he is also communicating with the VAR and he talks about the level of force," Collum added.

"He also talks about the studs and, for him, there's no use of the studs here. The VAR look at the images and they don't see anything either that tells them anything other than that."

However, Rangers sporting director Kevin Thelwell declared the club "very, very frustrated" with the SFA's approach following "strong conversations" and added that the club "still fundamentally disagree" with the Trusty punishment in particular.

"We all feel like it's a dangerous precedent to be saying that striking somebody on the head is nothing short of a red card," he told Rangers TV. So, from our perspective, we want to have another conversation with the SFA.

"We've been doing some analysis of our own over a much wider period and want to talk to them again about some of that detail for one reason and one reason only - and that is, we want greater consistency."

Collum also backed the decision to send off Rangers midfielder Thelo Aasgaard for a high challenge on Anthony Ralston in the same match.

He also backed the yellow card for Rangers centre-half Derek Cornelius for a challenge on Johnny Kenny - because the tackle was low and caught the striker's boot.

Collum also agreed with the decision to penalise Ralston for handball in the box but not issue a second yellow card.

"This is not an obvious goalscoring opportunity for us, absolutely not, it doesn't meet the criteria for that," he said. "Liam Scales is behind here and also the goalkeeper has a chance to save."