Rangers have asked the Scottish Football Association to release VAR audio relating to the decision not to award them a penalty during the 2-1 Old Firm defeat on Saturday.

The Ibrox want to understand why a spot-kick wasn’t given for an incident that took place in the first half involving Celtic defender Alistair Johnston. The Canadian appeared to handle the ball in the penalty box when challenging Abdallah Sima and while referee Nick Walsh was told to pause play while VAR Willie Collum checked footage, Walsh was not told to look at the monitor.

Sky Sports commentator Ian Crocker later explained that the reason the original decision was not reviewed was due to an offside in the build-up to the incident but Rangers remain unhappy at events. They went on to lose the game 2-1 after goals from Paulo Bernardo and Kyogo Furuhashi put Celtic eight points clear at the top of the Premiership.

Rangers claim for a penalty after the ball hits the arm of Celtic's Alistair Johnston.

A statement from Rangers read: "Rangers have asked the Scottish FA to make the VAR audio available to the club to understand why no penalty was awarded despite a clear handball by Celtic's Alistair Johnston.

"The club is keen to understand the process that led to that decision being made as it was not made public at the time, nor communicated to our team. We also understand Sky as the league's official broadcaster is deeply unhappy and confused with the situation. Their panel spent half-time in agreement Rangers should have been awarded a penalty, unaware of any offside check.

"Again this only surfaced in the second-half. Rangers remain advocates of VAR but there must be significantly more transparency for it to be successful in Scottish football."

Rangers issue VAR statement after Celtic defeat and call for audio release over penalty incident