Hibernian wrongly denied penalty against St Mirren, says Scottish FA KMI panel

Hibs should have been awarded a penalty late in their 1-1 draw with St Mirren last month, a Scottish FA panel has said.

The Easter Road side had fought back from a goal down in the match on August 31, and were pushing for a winner in injury time.

Striker Thibault Klidje had an effort on goal blocked by St Mirren defender Jayden Richardson, who had his hands raised in front of his face when struck by the ball.

No penalty was given, and the ball was swiftly cleared, but VAR did not intervene to ask referee Matthew MacDermid to review the incident. There was no further incident and the team’s settled for a point each.

The Scottish FA’s Key Match Incident panel reviews all major decisions and considered the incident along with a number of other flashpoints from the fourth round of Premiership fixtures.

The three panel members, who are independent of the association, ruled unanimously that a mistake had been made and Hibs should have had the opportunity to score from the spot.

The panel’s report read: “The panel unanimously agreed that the on-field decision was incorrect.

“The panel highlighted VAR was incorrect not to intervene to recommend an OFR [on-field review] and a penalty should have been awarded for handball.”

The decision was rated as being of medium difficulty, with it marked as a three out of five on the panel’s scale. It was described as “A more complex decision with a greater degree of subjectivity and/or more factors to consider, that a select group official should nonetheless call correctly.”

The panel said that other decisions in the game, such as the decision to let St Mirren’s opening goal stand despite a potential offside in the build-up, and MacDermid’s decision not to give the visitors a penalty for Rocky Bushiri’s challenge on Jonah Ayunga, had reached the correct outcome.

Hibs head coach David Gray refused to use the decision as an excuse for not winning, but admitted he felt VAR should have helped the match official.

“I don’t blame the referee at all,” Gray said. “He gets one chance to see it, it happens that quickly. “Sometimes you can tell by the players’ reactions that something’s happened and I think that’s why VAR has been brought in.

“It’s been brought in to help the referees, to assist them, to make sure they get the opportunity to put something right. I would probably ask the question why he wasn’t asked to go and see the screen because I think his hand is away from his body, it is high.

“Yes, he’s very close but if it doesn’t hit his hand, it goes in the goal. I think that’s a pretty fair assessment of what happens. I’m not saying it’s deliberate; I’m not saying anything like that at all, but I think it at least needs to be explained why it wasn’t a penalty.”

All other decisions made across the top flight on the same weekend were considered to be correct.