At first glance, season 1963/64 was another dreadful season for Celtic, and there is no real point in denying that. Rangers won a treble in Scotland, and beat Celtic five times 3-0, 3-0, 2-1, 1-0 and 2-0. Celtic had a major complex about Rangers…
Let us talk about this aspect first. The end of season 1962/63 had seen the spectacular and tragic Cup final in which the Celtic End, almost to a man, disappeared with 25 minutes to go. We could have done with NOT having Rangers to open the season, but Rangers it was on 10 August in the rain at Parkhead. This game became almost a template for future Celtic v Rangers games this season – namely a bright start with chances missed, an unfortunate occurrence in the shape of a refereeing decision, a defensive error or sheer bad luck, the inability to recover immediately and then a dismal collapse in the second half.
It was a bad mistake by Billy McNeill
In the opening game, it was a bad mistake by Billy McNeill who was short on a pass back, and Jim Forrest (no relation, I don’t think, to our current Jamesie) nipped in to score. It was downhill to perdition from then on.
No-one would deny that Rangers in 1963/64 had a good side (they weren’t GREAT however because they got a real doing from Real Madrid in the European Cup) but the main element in all the Celtic defeats to them lay in the lack of mental toughness, and the psychological belief that somehow we were not allowed to beat them.
It permeated Celtic right through from the Chairman all the way down to the humblest supporter
It permeated Celtic right through from the Chairman all the way down to the humblest supporter, and even at our high points of that season – at the turn of the year, and in March after a European success, we seemed to have to obey the immutable, Greek tragedy, carved in stone law that we must lose to Rangers. Rangers, sadly, twigged to that one as well and approached these games with confidence and indeed arrogance. It was almost the way of things.
