Fan group FAC are confident there won’t be a repeat this weekend of the crush which happened the last time the Rangers played at Celtic Park.
Yesterday Celtic released the independent report that the club commissioned after the crush incident on the Janefield Street underpass behind the North Stand at Celtic Park and you can read about that HERE.
Listen to FAC’s take on the crush, their thoughts on the report and the role of Police Scotland in exacerbating the situation last September.
“Time for a real review,” is their conclusion…
FAC’s take on the incident at September’s match, the newly released report and the role of Police Scotland in exacerbating the situation. Time for a real review. https://t.co/I1zGhK5skh
— FAC (@FACKilltheBill) March 28, 2019
The new arrangements that are now in place for this Sunday’s game should ensure that there is no repeat of the crush that saw thousands of supporters stuck together outside the ground from around half an hour before the match kicked-off.
It is pretty shocking to think that these matters were NOT properly considered ahead of the first ever game against the Rangers at Celtic Park with the new reduced allocation for away supporters.
The Celtic Star made the point continually that Police Scotland had working plans for Celtic v Rangers games at the three Glasgow stadiums but these were all based on the same number of supporters of each side attending each game. Celtic would for example occupy the Free Broomloan stand at Ibrox and Rangers supporters would occupy the space to the right hand side of the Lisbon Lions stand at Celtic Park. At Hampden each group of supporters have their own ‘end’.
The situation was changed after a Rangers supporter led campaign to restrict the number of Celtic fans at Ibrox, on the back of numerous heavy defeats to the Hoops in their own patch.
Celtic responded in kind but more thought and consideration could and should have been put into the alterations to the policing plan that would be necessary – given the changes in crowd numbers for each side. This work that has now been done after a ‘near miss’ on a disaster last September.
Celtic earlier today released detailed information for the support ahead of Sunday’s Glasgow Derby. This is titled Important information for Sunday’s derby match at Celtic Park as reads as follows:
THERE will be a capacity crowd at this Sunday’s Glasgow derby match, which has a 12noon kick-off, and we would ask all supporters to arrive early at Celtic Park and allow plenty of time for your journey, the stadium will open from 10:30am.
Please be mindful of your turnstile location and where practical, approach the stadium from the side of your allocated seat.
ARRIVING ON FOOT
From 10:30am until 11am, there will be no pedestrian access for Celtic fans to a section of London Road as shown on the map below in yellow.
Pre-match segregation will be in place until 11am, as shown in yellow on the map below.
THERE will be a capacity crowd at this Sunday’s Glasgow derby match, which has a 12noon kick-off, and we would ask all supporters to arrive early at Celtic Park and allow plenty of time for your journey, the stadium will open from 10:30am.
Please be mindful of your turnstile location and where practical, approach the stadium from the side of your allocated seat.
ARRIVING ON FOOT
From 10:30am until 11am, there will be no pedestrian access for Celtic fans to a section of London Road as shown on the map below in yellow.
Pre-match segregation will be in place until 11am, as shown in yellow on the map below.
From 11am, all external segregation will be removed, allowing supporters on foot to move freely around the stadium footprint including London Road, as shown in green in the map below.
ARRIVING BY VEHICLE
From 10am, London Road will be closed to vehicles between Springfield Road and the Clyde Gateway until post-match.
ARRIVING BY TRAIN
ScotRail have advised that services will be very busy on Sunday and ask passengers to buy tickets before boarding the train. There’s @NetworkRailSCOT improvement works taking place so please allow plenty of time to get to the match – buses replace trains between Rutherglen, Motherwell, Whifflet & Larkhall. Please follow @scotrail on Twitter for any further updates.
The Ticket Office and Superstore will both be open as normal from 9am.
POST-MATCH
Please note that it WILL NOT be possible to travel east to west or west to east using the North Stand underpass at full-time.
Additional signage and stewards will be in place to direct supporters at full-time.
Finally, don’t forget the clocks go forward by one hour on Sunday!
We hope all of our supporters have a great day and enjoy the match.
ENDS.
