Former Celtic striker Chris Sutton has responded to accusations made by Graeme Souness regarding his alleged attempt to influence VAR during the recent Old Firm derby. The controversy arose after Sutton criticized the decision to award Rangers a penalty following a VAR intervention, referring to it as “embarrassing” and questioning the need for VAR to intervene in the first place. Souness accused Sutton of bias towards Rangers and suggested that he was trying to influence VAR officials with his strong commentary. Contrary to Souness’s claim, Sutton denied attempting to influence VAR and dismissed the accusations as “utter nonsense.”

He emphasized that his commentary was based on what he saw during the match and not motivated by any bias towards Celtic or Rangers. Additionally, he humorously addressed Souness’s insinuation that he held significant sway over VAR officials. Souness’s belief that Sutton may have been trying to influence VAR officials by his commentary was refuted when it was clarified that VAR officials do not listen to the commentary during matches. Despite this clarification, Souness continued to express his suspicion that Sutton had gone to extreme lengths to influence the VAR decision.

Overall, Sutton defended his commentary as an honest assessment of the match incident and refuted any suggestion of bias or attempts to influence the VAR decision.