Controversial penalty denies Celtic in Europe

A late, soft penalty saw Celtic denied a victory against Udinese tonight, despite an excellent performance from the home side.

This was a tale of two penalties, one at the start that Celtic get off to the best possible start and then one at the death that saw a deserved three points grabbed away from the home side.

As he burst into the box Gary Hooper was sent sprawling by Joel Ekstrand. There was some confusion over who gave the decision with all three officials at that end of the ground hesitating before giving the decision.

Celtic trusted the spot kick to Ki Sung-Yueng who rammed his penalty expertly high into the net with the keeper going the wrong way.

The home side were the better of the two sides in the first half with Kayal looking strong in midfield although Celtic didn’t really put enough pressure on the Udinese keeper.

Things were slightly different in the second half the Italians had the ball in the net when Benatia knocked the ball into the empty net after an excellent passing move had cut Celtic open. The referee initially awarded a goal but then disallowed it for either tug on Hooper or the scorer being offside.

The equaliser did come with three minutes left on the clock when the ref awarded a soft penalty. Hooper did stick his chest out by and gave the ref and the Udinese player every chance to make a decision, when it may have been better if he had kept out the way and let the ball roll to Ki who was sweeping up.

Almen Abdi stepped up to place his penalty beyond Lukasz Zaluska to level the score, and deny what could have been a deserved three points for Celtic.

At least it gets them off the mark, with one point on the board ahead of a double header with French Champions Rennes.