Celtic manager to continue Juventus protests

Celtic manager Neil Lennon has vowed to continue his protests against Juventus’ set-piece defending in his side’s 3-0 Champions League loss to the Italians on Tuesday.

The Scottish outfit have continuously maintained throughout the week that Spanish referee Alberto Undiano Mallenco’s decision to not award a penalty at any point was a grave injustice.

Lennon now has devised a new tactic to show his disapproval, one which will involve European football’s governing body, UEFA.

“We’ll compile a DVD and send it off and just look for an explanation on some of the decisions,” the tactician said.

“You don’t see our players doing that. There were pictures of the shirt coming off Gary Hooper’s back, credit to him for keeping his cool.

“It’s a myth that Juventus ‘did their homework’. That’s rubbish. Juventus defend like that week-in, week-out in Serie A.

“If anything we had done our homework and we made sure the referee was aware of it and he was looking at it time and again and Juventus went unpunished.

“We needed a strong referee and we didn’t have that.

“As I said after the game, 10 or 11 years ago we got a penalty against Juventus in the exact same circumstances, the player was warned about grappling with Chris Sutton, the corner comes in he did again and the referee gave a penalty.

“Have the rules changed since then?”

Celtic will travel to Turin to take on the Bianconeri in the two-legged affair’s return tie on March 6.

You can follow Ian Capasso on Twitter: @capasso10