Celtic FC Women stars Murphy Agnew and Amy Gallacher were joined by the men’s first team Bhoys Liam Scales and Matt O’Riley to promote the launch of Celtic’s Irish origins collection. This new range is available now from all Celtic stores ahead of St Patrick’s Day this Sunday when Murphy and Amy will be in action against theRangers Women in the first match post-split in the SWPL1.
Remember in the SWPL1 the split takes place after all sides have played each other twice. Then the top six and bottom six go their separate ways to play each other home and away. This will be the fourth time Celtic have hosted theRangers Women this season, twice in the league and once in both the Glasgow Cup and the Sky Sports Cup.
On all three occasions there hasn’t been the hint of bother and it was the same in previous few seasons – with the only trouble coming on the park when theRangers Assistant Manager Craig McPherson assaulted Fran Alonso from behind.
There was a manager in Italy last weekend who did something similar and the next day was sacked. In contrast theRangers just stayed silent and allowed the Scottish FA to issue the softest of punishments. Presumably Police Scotland are still investigating an incident that was broadcast live on Sky Sports. So the only violence at a Women’s Glasgow Derby came from an employee of theRangers who kept his job. True story, that.
Anyway, Celtic FC Women have only been the away side once this season against theRangers – in the recent match at Ibrox. You will remember that the Celtic allocation of just over 700 tickets was sold out to Celtic supporters who purchased via the ticket sale on the official Celtic website. Most of these would have been to Celtic FC Women season ticket holders.
Yet on the morning of the match theRangers contacted Celtic and asked our club to pay for policing costs because Police Scotland had advised that there was a small number of supporters from Celtic Bhoys who could have purchased tickets. Celtic to their credit stood up for the Celtic FC Women support and told them to do one, pay your own bills etc. That’s a concept that they are only vaguely familiar with over there, it’s the same club right?Then theRangers brought in a last minute blanket ban on all Celtic supporters attending the match.
Some still made it along but just a handful. Now Celtic are the hosts on St Patrick’s Day, what will happen? Will Police Scotland contact Celtic and say that there’s a similar chance that the Union Bears will buy tickets? There is you know, just the same was as the Green Brigade could have gone to Ibrox – as theRangers fans subsequently believe was the case. As usual they got it all wrong.
Will Celtic ask theRangers to pay for the policing costs and if they refuse will Celtic ban their supporters at the eleventh hour just as they were happy to do to the Celtic support? That’s the Celtic support who have collectively done more than any other group of fans to populate the women’s game in Scotland.
Let’s suppose Celtic do nothing, just allow theRangers supporters to attend as usual. And Celtic win. The league gets very tight between the top two and it all comes down to the final meeting of the season at either Broadwood or more likely at Ibrox. What assurances will Celtic have that our supporters will be allowed to attend? The answer is none because they simply cannot be trusted. We have now seen this in the women’s game and we know all about it in the men’s game.
In the summer Celtic argued that the away corner at Ibrox was unsafe for Celtic supporters after SEVEN serious assaults happened with supporters being struck by various objects including a Buckfast bottle. The perpetrator was caught and is current doing time at His Majesty’s Pleasure. The latest Ibrox club AGREED that the corner was unsafe and PROMISED to install large nets to prevent similar situations happening again. No nets have been installed.
Like it or not but in the days of the Old Firm the two clubs had agreed rules that they both stuck to, thus the name. Damage at grounds etc was hushed up, the perpetrators caused their own club to foot the bill, the show had to go on.
These days there is no such cooperation and in order to gain an advantage at a title decider at Ibrox you can be pretty much certain that it will cross their minds again to keep out the Celtic FC Women support.
Celtic know that theRangers cannot be trusted. We have seen it with the reduction in capacity at Ibrox due to Celtic winning there too often, yet they lie repeatedly about this trying to blame Celtic or create other excuses. Yet they all know and we all know.
The women’s situation is even worse because the game in Scotland needs supporters to grow. On the weekend that theRangers banned 700 supporters – mostly families, with many small children attending a Glasgow Derby – Arsenal Women had over 60,000 supporters for their game against their Manchester United rivals.
The Scottish game is miles away from that and it will never get anywhere if we are already closing the gates on supporters who want to follow the women’s game.
The SWPL1 board promised to discuss the ban on Celtic supporters at Ibrox at their board meeting the week after the game at Ibrox. They also told The Celtic Star that they would contact both clubs. Nothing has been said publicly and no assurances given to Celtic supporters – who may or may not have had their money refunded – that they will be allowed to attend the last Glasgow Derby of the season.
Celtic could simply ban theRangers Women support as a tit-for-tat retaliation but the Celtic supporters know that there is no trouble between both sets of fans. None whatsoever. Banning the Celtic support brought their hatred into the women’s game and it is welcomed by no-one except the warped, rogue club that would do anything at all, stoop to the lowest depths, to gain an advantage.
The Hun board care a lot more about their scummy support , than the Celtic board care about any part of the Celtic family ,so they will as usual ,do nothing and say nothing , Hail hail