Graeme McGarry: Motherwell captain Peter Hartley was daft

There is no doubt that Hartley saying he enjoyed watching a fellow professional weeping after being on the receiving end of a broken nose was stupid, crass, and lacking in class.

The comment reflected badly on Hartley on a personal level and on his football club too, given that he is the captain. It is also hard to determine what benefit his team will get from it, with the subsequent articles prime ‘pin it on the dressing-room wall’ fodder for Steven Gerrard.

And with Craig Thomson, the referee for tomorrow’s game between the sides, dishing out five red cards to Motherwell last season, he surely didn’t want to encourage the whistler to be watching the home players even more closely than he otherwise would have.

Hartley has form for such bombastic soundbites though. Having met him on a few occasions, he seems a really decent bloke, but when a microphone is thrust in his direction there is no doubt there is a little devilment in there.

Prior to the Betfred Cup semi-final last season, the match in question, he caused another flutter when he warned Alfredo Morelos that he was more than up for the physical battle and wouldn’t mind a scrap after the match as well if that’s what the Rangers striker wanted.

Given that Morelos was off-colour in that game at Hampden, perhaps it was a ham-fisted attempt to get into the Colombian’s head again, and from that end, there may have been more than a hint of design that went into this. But whoever decided Hartley was the man to step in front of the cameras before this match can hardly say they didn’t know what might happen. You can’t wave the red rag at the bull and then complain when it spears somebody.

That being said, the fallout and handwringing on social media over the comments was so over the top that I almost thought Neil Lennon had cupped his ears at Ibrox again.

When did the supporters who used to loudly and proudly proclaim that no one likes them and they don’t care start, well, caring so much about what anyone says about them? And particularly in this case, when the jibe amounted to little more than playground nonsense over what was a relatively minor injury. However much the swollen hooter of Cardoso may disagree.

I had to laugh at some of the tweets that derided the Motherwell skipper for his lack of class in revelling in an injury to another player and then on the next line, lacking any sense of irony, happily wishing a broken leg on Hartley in tomorrow’s match.

Then there were the clipes tagging in Motherwell CEO Alan Burrows, and even tagging in the Scottish Football Association. Give me peace. Trial by Sportscene is one thing, but now we have trial by Twitter?

As it is, the SFA Compliance Officer is now looking into whether there is a case for Hartley to answer. As for the player himself, he has apologised publicly on Twitter ironically, where it was no doubt warmly received by all those commenting, and his manager Stephen Robinson has called his Rangers counterpart to offer his own words of regret.

To his great credit, Gerrard – who seems to be among the few maintaining a sense of perspective – accepted wholeheartedly and called for a line to be drawn under the episode.

“The kid has been naive, he’s got it badly wrong,” said Gerrard. “But, to be fair, he has been sharp to retract the comments and issue an apology.

“I think it’s important now that we focus on the football. There’s an exciting game to play on Sunday for both teams and I think we need to put that to bed. We accept the apology, we forgive and we move on.”

These measured comments will hopefully help to douse a potentially combustible situation in a game that was always likely to be a tasty affair in any case, and quench the thirst for retribution from the Rangers support.

No one is defending Hartley’s comments, but any disciplinary action from outwith his own club would be extreme. As Gerrard says, it is time to move on.