At this stage of season 1972-73, Celtic had been looking a little sluggish but had suddenly come up with good results against Ujpest Dosza and Aberdeen.
Now, on his day in 1972, they would have to raise their game again, this time against Dundee in a quarter-final second-leg tie in the League Cup, having lost the first leg 0-1 at Dens Park.
A crowd of 39,000 turned up at Celtic Park for the encounter, when the Hoops team was Williams, Hay, McGrain, McCluskey, Connelly, Callaghan, Johnstone, Dalglish, Deans, Macari and Lennox. It turned out to be a really competitive match, rather spoiled by some doubtful refereeing by Bobby Davidson.
Celtic went one-up through Bobby Lennox in 30 minutes; two minutes later, Dundee were level through Wallace.
Then Lou Macari came into the picture, notching twice in three minutes to put Celtic into a 3-1 lead but Dundee pulled one back in 54 minutes and at the final whistle, it was Celtic 3 Dundee 2, making the aggregate score 3-3. So, the teams would have to meet again to decide the winner, this time at Hampden on 20 November.
On this day, in 1879, Willie McAuley was born.
After a spell with Cambuslang Hibs, inside-forward Willie joined Celtic on 16 April 1898.
During the following season, he made his one and only appearance for the club in a league match against Third Lanark on 20 August 1898, when he scored in the 2-1 victory. Only days later, though, he was freed by the club and joined Sheffield Wednesday in October of that year.
Jim Craig
