Referee Steven McLean has disclosed why he came to the decision to cancel the Livingston-Aberdeen game at the Tony Macaroni Arena on Wednesday night.
The game was postponed just after it was due to kick off, due to a deluge of heavy rain. Now McLean has given the reasons why the game was called off, with player safety to the fore.
“It was playable on arrival, so any discussion around an earlier pitch inspection would have been of no benefit whatsoever” he began.
“Conditions then deteriorated”
“The weather conditions then deteriorated. During the warm-up, players from both sides thought the pitch was unsafe and had problems with their footing. I spoke to both clubs, and said I’ll conduct a pitch inspection after the warm-ups have concluded.
“We then done that, and had a conversation with representatives of both clubs, and we agreed that the pitch was unsafe to start the match. It’s the last thing we want to do, but player safety has to be the number one priority” he said.
“Has to come first”
“My concern is player safety. Player safety has to come first. It’s important that the players have perspective on that, and that’s my number one priority” McLean concluded.
When you see those comments then there can be few complaints about the decision that was made by McLean. Player safety was the most important thing, and as a result the referee made the right decision.
It is just unfortunate that the timing of the postponement was so late. However, that would have been far worse if fans were in attendance.