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Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward

Herald Scotland

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Kenneth Ward: How SFA's VAR success claims lack real substance The question our 12 Premiership clubs need to ask themselves at the end of the campaign is this: is the £1.2m outlay for VAR really necessary?

AFTER a recent routine spring clean of the household finances, I was confronted with a raft of unfair, skewed, politically motivated figures: an...

02.05.2024 10

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Celtic form quirk should give fans plenty of reasons to be fearful Celtic’s encounter at Hampden was an illustration of their entire campaign, and one which should send shudders down the Parkhead faithful’s spines.

A FEW weeks ago, I suggested that April could be the cruellest month for Rangers. And so it has proved, in the cinch Premiership at least. But is...

26.04.2024 10

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Clement should stop claiming victories when Rangers don't win

I STRONGLY disagree. No, not the customary response from the sports editor whenever I present him with this column. This was instead the retort from...

18.04.2024 20

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Derby debates fuel raging final Old Firm

IT may have been several days ago, but the backdraft from Sunday’s blazing 3-3 derby draw between Rangers and Celtic at Ibrox can still be felt like...

11.04.2024 6

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Have Scotland moved into technical recession?

THE international break is to the sports desk what one of those mysterious “in-service days” must be to teachers. Does anyone outside of education...

28.03.2024 10

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Could April be the cruellest month for Rangers' title hopes?

“April is the cruellest month”. So begins TS Eliot’s doomsday masterpiece The Waste Land. I think of that line every time I glance out at the...

21.03.2024 6

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Can Rodgers click into top gear as title race enters final lap?

WHEN Brendan Rodgers climbed into the Celtic cockpit for a second time last summer, he knew what he was getting himself into – so the merry refrain...

14.03.2024 4

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: VAR is a virtual reality damaging officials as well as clubs

BRENDAN RODGERS faces a touchline ban for the upcoming derby against Rangers over his criticisms of VAR John Beaton following last weekend's 2-0...

07.03.2024 5

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: How long can Scottish football continue to defend hellish VAR?

WHEN it comes to referees, I’ll forgive all manner of sins. All the little errors – throw-ins given the wrong way, pulled jerseys missed, balls...

29.02.2024 7

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Celtic support in need of a sign that Rodgers can retain title

SOMETIMES, it can feel like the universe is speaking to us. Those moments of synchronicity, where apparently unrelated coincidences bring meaning to...

22.02.2024 5

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Has Cyriel Dessers busted his own myth with scoring form?

DID you ever read The Da Vinci Code? Buy a James Blunt album? Watch the Twilight movies? Is the real answer the one you would admit in public? Now...

15.02.2024 4

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Flak for officials part of title race tactics

WITHOUT even looking at the cinch Premiership table, you can already sense there is a title race on. Every point gained or dropped, every chance taken...

08.02.2024 10

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Celtic come out of window in strong position

AFTER re-securing the back garden gate to a makeshift fencepost in the wake of Storm Isha, having picked through the wreckage of long-ago disregarded...

01.02.2024 7

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: UK Covid Inquiry highlights double standards for football

IS there a socially acceptable way to get blotto? Have a few cans and a bottle of tonic wine on the train to the game, and, like Bananaman after...

25.01.2024 4

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Celtic and Rangers' transfer policies should look closer to home

IF your email inbox is anything like mine, you’re probably being inundated daily with images of sunned Adonises bathing on foreign shores with...

18.01.2024 2

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Is there really a transparency issue at the SFA?

ON the back of the astounding success of the recent docuseries Alan Bates vs The Post Office, there’s maybe someone working behind the scenes at...

11.01.2024 20

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: 'Expensive error'? Rangers can look closer to home than VAR

IT was an “expensive” error. So said Rangers manager Philippe Clement in the immediate aftermath of his side’s 2-1 Premiership defeat to Celtic...

04.01.2024 4

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Who makes the list for top Scottish sporting moments in 2023?

COLD TURKEY anyone? Now that the Christmas dinner plates have been cleaned and put away, the tinsel hanging from every surface of the home is starting...

28.12.2023 10

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Premiership Scrooge Derek Adams needs to shape up fast

BAH, humbug! That favourite chorus line of the misanthrope. Charles Dickens conceived of the embittered Ebenezer Scrouge, who saw through yuletide...

21.12.2023 5

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: How Brendan Rodgers has progressed Celtic's European ambitions

SUMMER seems a distant memory. Events have shrunk from the mind like small boats on the horizon. Brendan Rodgers’ return to Glasgow in June occupies...

14.12.2023 9

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: Papal plaudits shine light on Celtic's Champions League woes

HE may have been forced to cancel his plans to attend COP28 in Dubai this weekend, but Pope Francis declared himself fit enough to honour his meeting...

30.11.2023 2

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Kenneth Ward: 'We've been VARed': The real factor behind Brendan Rodgers' record

WHAT’S the Spanish for “We’ve been VARed”? In fact, what is it in Italian, or Dutch for that matter? Come to think of it, what is it...

09.11.2023 4

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Scottish football have hit snooze on pyro alarm for too long

WHAT do you do when the smoke alarm sounds? The interminable tests we practised at school, shivering out in the cold in lines as an imaginary blaze...

02.11.2023 4

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Celtic belong in Champions League but they should consider tough route to proving it

COGITO, ergo sum. Three words which came to define Western philosophy in the face of modern times during the Enlightenment. For Celtic, holding onto...

26.10.2023 3

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Does anyone have a clue what VAR is actually supposed to be used for?

MENTION VAR these days and, coupled with an inevitably harassed sigh, one phrase you are almost certain to hear is “clear and obvious”. Ah yes, we...

19.10.2023 4

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Sima's Rangers cup strike shows up flaws in targeting VAR perfection

IS anyone else cowering in a purgatorial corner waiting for the Hollywood writers’ strikes to catch up with their diet of mind-numbing bingeworthy...

28.09.2023 2

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

Do Celtic possess the personality to succeed on biggest stage?

WHEN Celtic were drawn against Feyenoord, Atletico Madrid and Lazio in Champions League Group E at the end of last month, my eyes lit up. Not at the...

21.09.2023 2

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

The Celtic Park Champions League record Rodgers must flip to eclipse previous spell

FOR some, Brendan Rodgers’ return to Celtic was something of a damp squib. After a failure to launch in August following defeat to Kilmarnock in the...

14.09.2023 6

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

VAR far away: Rangers goal call correct but decision to check was out of this world

COLLECTING the middle child from school has been interesting. One experience this week felt like it had been sent by the refereeing gods as a sign, a...

07.09.2023 6

Herald Scotland

Kenneth Ward

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