Smith admits to error of judgement

20 September 2009 09:17
Smith was sent packing by referee Steve Conroy on Saturday for reacting furiously to Killie players who he mistakenly thought were trying to encourage the match official to show Pedro Mendes a second yellow card, after he had been harshly booked earlier in the match for another foul on Craig Bryson.[LNB]Both Smith and opposite number Jim Jefferies were in agreement that Conroy was wrong to dismiss both Mendes and Kilmarnock's Manuel Pascali as both teams ended up with 10 men.[LNB]Conor Sammon, in particular, was a target for Smith's vitriol and the Rangers boss admitted: "At the time, I felt the Kilmarnock players were surrounding the referee to get Mendes sent off but Jim assures me that's not the case.[LNB]"Jim says the boys just wanted the game to be played on. In this instance, I'm in the wrong with my reaction to that situation."[LNB]Jefferies added: "The confusion on the touchline was because Walter thought Conor's reaction was to get Mendes sent off but it wasn't, he wanted the referee to play advantage and then deal with it.[LNB]"I think Walter got a bit annoyed with him but I think it livened up the half-time team talk for both camps."[LNB]Smith then appeared to exchange words with a fan when sent to the directors box but said: "The boy was just congratulating me for getting sent off."[LNB]The flashpoint arrived just before half-time when Mendes picked up a second caution and Smith added: "I didn't feel that either foul was a particularly nasty one.[LNB]"His first yellow card was probably for his first foul of the game and I didn't see there was any great need for that type of action.[LNB]"For the second one, I didn't get a great view of whether he caught the player or not but, again, it wasn't a malicious one.[LNB]"It was strange that there ended up being two red cards in a game where there wasn't much in it at all."[LNB]Mendes became the third Rangers player to see red this season, following the dismissals of Kevin Thomson and Madjid Bougherra.[LNB]"It's frustrating," said Smith.[LNB]"If it's going to be like that, every time someone gets a yellow card, we are going to have to take them off otherwise we will have a situation where we will have them sent off.[LNB]"In my own mind, it never looked like a game where it was going to be out of control and it wasn't a dirty game."[LNB]Pascali was then dismissed late on, a decision Smith also felt was harsh on the Kilmarnock player.[LNB]He said: "If we are looking at a situation where we had two yellow cards for each of the players, I didn't think it warranted yellow cards for the challenges today.[LNB]"The referee was giving yellow cards for innocuous midfield challenges. Was there anything malicious in that game today? I didn't think there was."[LNB]Jefferies agreed with Smith's assessment of both red cards.[LNB]He said: "I think Steve Conroy is one of the best referees and I thought he handled a lot of the game well.[LNB]"But I didn't agree with him with the two sending-offs. Mendes' first booking definitely wasn't a booking, it was his first foul in the game.[LNB]"I said at half-time that the big worry was that he might try to even the score. I've been long enough in the game to know that, especially against the Old Firm with the pressure the referees are under.[LNB]"It was nothing daft or stupid, the boy just closed him down and fell over him and it was a very harsh booking."[LNB]Killie boasted the two best chances of the game, with Danny Invincibile passing up a great chance to open the scoring before Jamie Hamill struck the post.[LNB]Jefferies said: "We have never beaten Rangers down here and that was a great chance. It's not often I'd say this against Rangers or Celtic but I thought we probably threw two points away."[LNB][LNB]

Source: Team_Talk