Hearts fans fume over REAL Rangers penalty anger as Steven Naismith flags up ‘wrong’ referee gripe

Miffed Hearts supporters reckon boss Steven Naismith was making the wrong argument over the penalty which sparked Rangers’ rocking comeback.

Peter Haring grabbed Connor Goldson’s shirt and James Tavernier converted to make it 1-1 after man in the middle John Beaton was pinged by VAR to review the incident on the pitchside monitor. And the Ibrox skipper’s goal – after missing from the spot – sparked the Scottish Premiership comeback which was sealed by Danilo’s winner in added time.

Hearts’ followers, players and boss Naismith were left floored but a clutch of Gorgie punters reckon the wrong gripe was raised by their boss in the aftermath post-mortem. Naismith was stewing over the award itself but that wasn’t the incident which left the Jambos faithful seething. Many flooded social media, forums and call-in shows to share their anger over a decision they reckon Beaton got wrong.

Kenneth Vargas proved a livewire for Hearts and the Costa Rica international appeared fuming after he felt he was tumbled over by two hands in the back from Rangers sub Ross McCausland. Vargas was apoplectic when Beaton awarded Rangers the free-kick for handball which got the hosts up the pitch and resulted in the corner where Haring crudely grabbed hold of Goldson and set in motion an unlikely comeback for the hosts. Vargas appeared to be relaying the incident back to Beaton when he was booked in the dying seconds.

But the Vargas incident wasn’t what was grumping the Hearts boss. He said: “The (second) penalty is a defining moment in the game. It’s not a penalty. If VAR is here to stop things happening; throughout the whole game we highlighted that there was clear blocking going on in the box, where the players are not interested in the ball, they are looking at our players, which I was then told ‘if that happens and they score from it, it would then be brought back as a foul.’ Then the penalty they get, the initial contact is made by a player blocking our player, which VAR should then go and look at.

“I spoke to the referee after it and he said he wasn’t shown any images where there was a block. So I don’t know if there has been a miscommunication or what the process is, but ultimately it has failed us today.”