STEVEN NAISMITH is the new Tuesday night pundit on BBC Sportsound, joining the likes of Kris Boyd on that publicly funded show. The Hearts player last night spoke about his brutal attack on Jonny Hayes in the recent game at Tynecastle which was the second Hearts v Celtic game in a row that Naismith avoided seeing red – remember THAT tackle on Scott Brown in the previous game?
Naismith admitted that he was wrong and revealed that he had apologised to Johnny Hayes afterwards.
One thing of note at the time was the failure of Hayes’ Celtic team-mates to reaction with the appropriate level of physicality to the new BBC pundit at the time. Stuart Armstrong, now of course at Southampton, was always there and prepared to get involved when these incidents occurred. Hayes would have every right to feel let down, watching it back.
“I had the red mist. It was a tackle that came in that was pretty similar to when I had my first knee injury.
“That was what was going through my head and I was totally wrong in my reaction. It was the heat of the moment.
“Even after it, I was saying to Jonny Hayes during the game, ‘Look are you alright, sorry about that.’
“I didn’t realise he was that injured at the time. It was more a reaction to getting scythed down.”
Naismith was asked what he was screaming in Hayes’ ears as he lay injured on he long grass.
“I can’t even remember,” was his reply.
The SFA’s Compliance Officer decided not to take any further action against Naismith for his Red Mist’ incident. He also ‘excused’ Scott Brown for a supposed ‘elbow’ incident that was only picked up by someone with mobile phone footage. This was reported to the Compliance Officer by a BBC reporter.
His BBC Sportsound colleagues never bothered to ask Naismith about kicking Scott Brown in his crown jewels in the game in May, which he was retrospectively punished for – but served his ban in the matches against Cove Rangers.
Hearts fielded an ineligible player in one of those games but the SFA docked them only 2 points – rather than 3 as per the rules – allowing them to stay in the competition. A subsequent high scoring win over Inverness Caley Thistle was enough to eliminate the Highlanders who would have progressed had the rules been followed.
