The weekend’s results in the Scottish League Cup semi finals probably made a lot of people very happy with the Sunday game almost as good as the Saturday one…
The perfect tribute to Bertie Auld: a final between two teams he played for and one he managed (Hibs). Here's Bertie scoring in Celtic's win over Hibs in 1968-69 League Cup final. #CelticFC #Hibs pic.twitter.com/KrrGO89Fgd
— Phil Gordon (@PJG_Sport) November 21, 2021
But let no-one get the wrong end of the stick and begin to think that Celtic now have an easy job to win the Scottish League Cup. Absolutely not so! Indeed one could well argue that the ineptitude shown by the losers and the confidence shown by the winners means that Hibs are a more difficult team to deal with than what the losers might have been. Celtic may underestimate Hibs, but they would so at their peril.
Hibs have won the Scottish League Cup three times and have lost seven times in the final. Celtic have had 19 triumphs and 15 disappointments in the final.. Hibs have had their big moments against Celtic in 1972/73, Dunfermline Athletic in 1991/92 and Kilmarnock in 2006/07. Celtic have had six triumphs over Rangers, three over Aberdeen, two each over Hibs and Dundee United, and one each over Partick Thistle, Dundee, St Johnstone, Motherwell, Kilmarnock and Dunfermline.
One thing I would like to say about a Celtic v Hibs Scottish League Cup final. There is NO colour clash. There have been three Celtic v Hibs finals in the past. In each one of them, Celtic have worn the green and white hoops and Hibs have worn their traditional strips of green with white sleeves. Yes, both teams wear green and white, but they are quite different design!
So let’s have none of this yellow, or black with green trimmings stuff. Let us have the green and white of both teams. Ah, but … yes, I know what you are going to say, it’s all about replica strips for supporters and making money, and is there a better time than 19 December to sell these hideous pseudo-strips? Just in time for Santa Claus, that famous tool of wicked international capitalism! Let’s make sure there are no elves at Hampden.
There are certainly no — no, I’ll better not say that word! – at Hampden!
The three Scottish League Cup finals all came within six years in the late 1960s and early 1970s and were as follows;
First up, 1968/69
It was Celtic v Hibs for the Scottish League Cup final on 26 October 1968 – or so we thought. The night of Monday 21 October saw a fire at Hampden Park caused by an electrical fault which damaged the dressing rooms, and the League Cup final was immediately postponed to the spring. Fortunately no-one was around at the time, and no-one was injured. There was a copycat fire the following night at Ibrox which was clearly deliberate, but the Hampden one was a pure accident which perhaps said something about the antiquity and general neglect of the old stadium.
But then Hibs did something so bizarre and so betraying of their supporters that it was difficult to avoid the charge of “money grubbing”. Colin Stein (no relation of Celtic’s Jock) had been playing well for Hibs, scoring goals regularly. His problem was that he had a poor disciplinary record, was suspended and would have been ineligible for the Scottish League Cup final on 26 October.
The fire looked as if it had done Hibs a good turn. Clearly Colin Stein would have been available for April when the final was eventually played, but in November, Hibs staggered the footballing world by selling him to Rangers for £100,000!
Why there were no boycotts and rebellions among the Easter Road support is a mystery, particularly when Rangers then beat Hibs 6-1 soon afterwards, and Colin Stein scored a hat-trick! In the long and lamentable catalogue of Hibs’ betrayals of their supporters, this one was a collector’s item! And this was when they were in a Cup final!
On 5 April 1969, with the damage at Hampden repaired, the final eventually took place. Whether Colin Stein would have made any difference or not is open to question, but the day certainly belonged to the other Stein, for Celtic played one of the best games of football that one could have imagined. And yet Hibs did not play badly, entering into the spirit of flowing attacking football and helping to produce in the fine Easter sunshine a display that none of the 74,240 crowd would forget for a long time.
Celtic, with a point to prove for they had recently gone out of the European Cup in heart breaking fashion to AC Milan, started playing towards their own supporters at the King’s Park End and were 3-0 up at half-time with Willie Wallace, Bertie Auld and Bobby Lennox scoring.
In the second half they began to play even better. Lennox completed his hat-trick (joining Billy McPhail, Willie Bauld, Davie Duncan and Jim Forrest in the Hall of Fame of League Cup final hat-trick heroes) and then full back Jim Craig scored as well before Hibs added two late goals to make the score 6-2.
The teams were:
Celtic: Fallon, Craig and Gemmell (Clark); Murdoch, McNeill and Brogan; Johnstone, Wallace, Chalmers, Auld and Lennox
Hibs: Allan, Shevlane and Davis; Stanton, Madsen and Blackley; Marinello, Quinn, Cormack, O’Rourke and Stevenson
Referee W Syme, Airdrie (there’s always one)
Next up, 1972/73
Celtic had played 12 games to reach Hampden in this particularly ill-organised League Cup season, and the final was scheduled for 9 December. Some newspapers suggested, not unreasonably, that December was no time to play a Cup final and that a postponement to the spring was an idea not without merit.
Most people within both clubs agreed, but the Scottish League decided that 9 December was when it should be for the second all green League Cup final in four years. The teams had also met in last year’s Scottish Cup final, the day of Dixie Deans’ hat trick and his famous somersault. But Dixie was not playing this time because of an injury and Hibs felt that they now had a chance.
Hibs were generally agreed to be the most annoying team to support. No club had a more dismal record of failing to win when they needed to, or of selling off their star players, sometimes at crazy times of the season and when there was no obvious need of money. Their support was solid, however, and it was clear that they were now the better team in Edinburgh, something that they would prove spectacularly a few weeks after the League Cup final.
They now had an energetic and committed Manager in Eddie Turnbull who had built up a strong team, called “Turnbull’s Tornadoes” with a great defence built around Pat Stanton and forwards like Alex Edwards and Jim O’Rourke with the ability to take a goal.
All that was needed, one felt, was a certain belief in themselves, but facing Celtic who had beaten them 6-1 in May at Hampden made it difficult to engender any great optimism in their support. There was also the undeniable historical fact that Hibs had won nothing of importance for over 20 years since they won the Scottish League in 1952. As far as the League Cup was concerned, they had appeared in only two finals and had lost the pair of them. Phrases like “trophy shy” were beginning to be applied to Hibs by the Press.
Celtic had exited from Europe a month previously, but since then, had played well, and although everyone agreed that Hibs would put up a good performance, it was generally felt that Celtic would just have the edge. The 71,696 crowd made their way to Hampden in what seemed a most unlikely sort of day for a Cup final. The weather was dull and cold, but fortunately there was no snow or ice – there would be the following year! – and even as the teams took the field, December darkness was beginning to fall, and people questioned the wisdom and even the sanity of those who arranged the League Cup final – a showpiece of the season – on such a day.
The first half mirrored the weather – dull and drab with little to warm the fans, and it was the 60th minute before anything happened. Celtic conceded a free kick in the edge of the box. It came to Pat Stanton who ran across the Celtic penalty area before squeezing the ball home. Six minutes later, Hibs took a grip of the game and Stanton was involved again, charging down the right wing before crossing for Jim O’Rourke to score. Celtic, to their credit, fought back and scored through Kenny Dalglish to set up what would have been a grandstand finish, but Hibs and Stanton took control again and finished quite clearly the better side.
So ended the 27th Scottish League Cup and Hibs headed back to Edinburgh in the darkness to celebrate their first ever triumph in this competition, some 70 and a bit years after they had won the Scottish Cup in 1902 against the same opponents. Life got even better for Hibs and their supporters on New Year’s Day 1973 when they beat Hearts 7-0! There were those who felt this Hibs team might have spearheaded the start of a permanent shift of power from Glasgow to Edinburgh. This was not to be, but in the meantime Celtic had to reckon with the fact that they had now lost three League Cup finals in a row.
The teams were:
Hibs: Herriot, Brownlie, Schaedler, Stanton, Black, Blackley, Edwards, O’Rourke, Gordon, Cropley and Duncan
Celtic: Williams, McGrain, Brogan, McCluskey, McNeill, Hay, Johnstone (Callaghan), Connelly, Hood, Dalglish, Macari
Referee: A McKenzie, Larbert
Then there’s 1974/75
For the third time, the Scottish League Cup final was between Celtic and Hibs. Both teams had won one final each, and with goal scorers like Joe Harper in the Hibs ranks and Dixie Deans playing for Celtic, it was widely expected that there would be loads of goals. No-one however could predict just what an entertaining game this would be.
It was generally felt that Celtic had the edge, mainly because they had beaten Hibs in the League the week before, but it was a League Cup final and Celtic had had a habit of losing them. Indeed they had lost the last four!
53,848 were at Hampden on a dry but coldish autumn day of 26 October 1974. Celtic supporters were not there in the huge numbers that we would have expected, but there was a sizeable contingent from Edinburgh. Celtic scored first through Jimmy Johnstone, and then Dixie Deans, who had scored a hat-trick the previous week in the League game against the two sides, scored one while surrounded by Hibs men. Joe Harper, however, pulled one back before half time. Celtic then went further ahead through Paul Wilson, Harper scored again to make it 3-2, but after that Celtic took command with a couple of goals from Deans and another from Steve Murray before Harper scrambled another for Hibs to make the final score 6-3.
The 5th goal was a total marvel. Jimmy Johnstone shot for goal but the ball was sliced wide apparently until Dixie Deans dived forward to score a remarkable reflex goal. Dixie had thus scored hat tricks in successive weeks against Hibs to add to his famous hat-trick in 1972 in the Scottish Cup final – again against Hibs! He would joke afterwards that he “didn’t like the green jersey”!
And a word of sympathy was due for Joe Harper of Hibs – not always the most immediately likeable of opponents – who performed the rare feat (unique in a major Cup final, it is believed) of scoring a hat-trick – but ending up on the losing side!
The teams were:
Celtic: Hunter, McGrain, Brogan, Murray, McNeill, McCluskey, Johnstone, Dalglish, Deans, Hood and Wilson
Hibs: McArthur, Brownlie (Smith) Bremner, Stanton, Spalding, Blackley, Edwards, Cropley, Harper, Munro, Duncan (Murray)
Referee: JRP Gordon, Newport on Tay
David Potter
The Gallowgate – A Hub of Celtic’s History by The Celtic Star writer Liam Kelly…
The Celtic Star is expanding. We reckon we have established the website as one of the very best at covering Celtic – the first team, the B squad and the Celtic FC Women side – together with our unrivalled coverage of Celtic’s fascinating, proud and unbroken history. Many should agree with that, judging be the hundreds of thousands who read the site every month, although some might not. That’s fair enough.
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On Friday night we published a video featuring Liam Kelly talking about Johnny Doyle receiving probably the most ridiculous ending off in the entire history of Scottish football in August 1977. You can watch that below.
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