1997 had certainly seen some sort of improvement in Celtic since the truly awful days of the early 1990s. The Scottish Cup had been won in 1995, and 1996 was a really good season – except that nothing was won. Rangers simply seemed to have the technique of winning when they had to. In particular they had the ability to beat Celtic. Often it all depended on lucky goalkeeping, sheer bad luck or refereeing decisions that were later proved by TV to be wrong.
The point about that, of course, was that Celtic found themselves dependent on things like refereeing decisions. Refereeing decisions only really matter in a close game, and if Celtic had been far enough ahead, a referee could only have had limited power. It is very easy to assume a conspiracy, even when the facts don’t really back one’s case, but the real problem, as far as Celtic were concerned, was one of expectation.
Celtic went into games against Rangers expecting to lose – and therefore did. Those of us old enough to recall the early 1960s saw this all coming back. Inferiority complexes are very difficult to rid oneself of, and Celtic had not beaten Rangers since an unimportant and irrelevant League game in May 1995. There had been several draws (and honourable ones) but Rangers had held the upper hand, and had not tasted defeat since that date..
However, Rangers were put to Celtic Park in the Scottish Cup draw (and all those of the “I knew it! Rangers and Celtic getting kept apart for the final” persuasion were forced to eat humble pie yet again!) and the game, somewhat controversially to keep the TV company happy, was scheduled for a Thursday night. This did not suit everyone (to put it mildly), but it did have the benefit of allowing more people to see the game on TV than might otherwise have been the case.
Rangers had already won the Scottish League Cup this season, and were ahead in the League, but Celtic were not entirely out of it and a good run could yet have landed the title to stop Rangers winning their ninth League in a row. But it was the Scottish Cup, historically Celtic’s favourite trophy, which represented our most realistic chance of an honour this season.
Celtic were managed by Tommy Burns in 1997. Tommy’s love for the club shone through, but it was also clear that he was under pressure to perform. It was often said of Billy McNeill that he was too much of a supporter to be a Manager, and the same might have been said of Tommy.
The team was a good one and capable of good football with Jorge Cadete and Paolo Di Canio brilliant footballers, but not always showing the mental stability, stamina or basic love for the club and its supporters (as distinct from love of themselves) that is also required in a Celtic football player. There was also Paul McStay, deservedly called “the maestro” now coming to the end of his career, and honest hard working Celts like Peter Grant, Phil O’Donnell, Jackie McNamara and Tosh McKinlay. They were no mean side – even though they often disappointed.
Against that, Rangers, with their foreign hirelings, had a relentless look about them. Possibly Celtic had the better players, but Rangers were more successful as a team. And yet all that was really needed was for someone some time to have the physical and mental strength to stand up to Rangers. What the early 1990s had proved was that if Celtic did not stand up to them, no-one else would either. Aberdeen, Motherwell, Kilmarnock and Dundee United could all have their moments, but lacked staying power. It was therefore all the more incumbent on Celtic to do the job. Although a Cup tie was always a one-off, what supporters really wanted from Celtic was consistency of performance.
Celtic began kicking towards the Lisbon Lions end of the ground. That part of the stadium was now complete, although the other end still had its temporary accommodation. Celtic immediately seized the game by the scruff of the net and attacked. There had already been several close things – including a dreadful miss from Phil O’Donnell – before Celtic won a corner on the left. It was taken by di Canio, a more or less perfect corner which found the head of one time bank clerk Malky Mackay, one of Celtic’s lesser sung heroes, who bulleted the ball past Andy Goram. Goram had come out for the ball and missed. It was a great goal and The Daily Record the following morning had the headline that Rangers had been “Malkied”, the word “malky” being the Glasgow gangland slang for a murder!
With Parkhead now on fire, the team kept pressing and some 6 or 7 minutes later, they went two ahead. A long ball from Tosh McKinlay reached the penalty box and was pursued by Jorge Cadete and Bjorklund of Rangers. Bjorklund bundled Cadete over, and Mr McCluskey correctly awarded a penalty. There have been more clear-cut penalties than that one, but there was contact and a penalty was the correct decision. Di Canio then calmly and gently sent Goram the wrong way to put Celtic 2-0 up, as delirium reigned in the high stands of Celtic Park.
Celtic continued to press and a few minutes after the penalty was awarded, Mr McCluskey turned down a far better penalty claim than the one that Celtic got. This time it was Di Canio who was barged by Alan McLaren when the ball was some distance away, and TV replays showed clearly that Mr McCluskey got that one wrong. To be fair, di Canio did go down rather theatrically – but he was an Italian and an actor at the best of times. He had the looks of an opera singer in the Milan Opera House and the temperament to go with it, but he was much loved by everyone at Celtic Park, and he really should have had another penalty that time.
Celtic did not now make the mistake of defending their lead. They kept pressing and pressing and by half time Rangers were completely overrun and glad to hear the half time whistle. Rangers had seldom been in the Celtic half, apart from very early on in the game when Brian Laudrup, possibly Rangers only “flair” player, came close. Rangers’ apologists kept saying that if Gough and Gascoigne had been playing, it might have been a different matter, but the truth was that no Rangers team (and very few European teams) could have lived with Celtic on that form that night.
The pace sagged a little in the second half, but the intensity didn’t. Celtic now decided that consolidation was perhaps a good idea, not necessarily total concentration on defence, but more controlled and calm possession of the ball. Tackles became quite fierce and five men were booked – Ferguson, McLaren and Robertson of Rangers, and Stubbs and Annoni of Celtic – and Mr McCluskey talked severely to several others. Craig Moore was particularly lucky not be shown a card of some colour or another, not least for the time that he wrestled substitute Andy Thom to the ground before Thom had even touched the ball!
And then we had Ally McCoist coming on as a substitute. Ally had talked himself into comparison with Jimmy McGrory by saying that he needed just one more Old Firm goal to equal Jimmy McGrory’s record (to be fair to Ally, he always respectfully called him “Mr McGrory”) but Ally, as he possibly realised himself, was no Jimmy McGrory, and any comparison was ludicrous. And when he skied one shot miles over the bar, he was told that by the Celtic fans.
But all the time Celtic were edging towards a historic victory. In truth, one began to feel that Rangers and their fans were beginning to agree, and although they made desperate attempts to rally and get the one goal that would have brought them back into the game, the Celtic defence of Alan Stubbs and, the hero of the night, Malky Mackay were well on top of them. The full time whistle came with “The Soldiers’ Song” in full flow, and Parkhead was a happy and relieved place that night. It was also the night that the Celtic players did a huddle in the centre circle at full time to celebrate what was a famous victory.
The afterglow lasted all weekend (Celtic had no game on the Saturday or the Sunday) and one had the happy sight of more smiling faces in Scotland than there had been for a long time. Rangers could not now do a treble, and more importantly, Celtic had shown that they had the ability to beat Rangers and that they could yet mount a challenge for the Scottish League.
And did they? Well, no, actually. The flush of victory had not yet died down before Celtic collapsed pitifully at Kilmarnock, and then the defeat to Rangers at Parkhead was a total disgrace with several players on each side clearly offering to settle matters with their fists, and Rangers doing a mock huddle – and wondering why everyone hated them so much! Then Celtic blew up in the Scottish Cup as well to Falkirk in a very wet Wednesday night replayed semi-final at Ibrox.
Celtic’s travails were not yet over and in general 1997 must go down as a poor year, but the night of 6 March was an indication of what could have been. And we had put them out of the Scottish Cup yet again.
David Potter
Extended Highlights below…
Scottish Cup quarter final, Celtic Park, 6 March 1997
Celtic: Kerr; Annoni, McKinlay, McNamara, Mackay, Grant, di Canio (Thom), McStay, Stubbs, O’Donnell (Hannah), Cadete.
Rangers: Goram, Cleland (Durrant), Robertson, Petric, McLaren, Bjorklund, Moore, Ferguson, Bo Anderson, (McCoist) , Albertz,( Van Vossen), Laudrup
Referee: Mr J McClukey, Stewarton
Attendance: 49,519
POST-MATCH INTERVIEWS COURTESY OF THE CELTIC WIKI...
CELTIC MANAGER TOMMY BURNS: “I’m thrilled for our fans – they can go to work with a smile on their face. The players gave all they could and we had the breaks we needed at the right time.
“The team followed my instructions perfectly. We’ve shown we can play more than one way against Rangers. But it is only one win. The fact that it came against Rangers makes it a bit more special because it’s a first for a lot of our players.
“We now need to get ourselves ready for our most important game of the season – not a week on Sunday but against Kilmarnock on Tuesday. The only drawback is that Paolo di Canio has a slight hamstring injury, possibly a tear, but we’ll see about that tomorrow.”
RANGERS MANAGER WALTER SMITH: “Celtic claim they never get any decisions but they got this one. I hope this ends the Protestant conspiracy theory. Tonight shows Celtic can win if they play well enough.
CELTIC GOALSCORER MALKY MACKAY: “Only my dad would have bet on me to score. I was 50/1 for the first goal and nobody but him would have had a bit of those odds. That was the best game of my life.
“I didn’t need any motivation – every game for Celtic is like that for me. Scoring so early in front of 50,000 settled us down and there can’t be many better feelings than that. It shocked me to get a free header for my goal, but I was surprised all the way through the game with the space we had.
“We had a couple of penalty claims turned down but don’t forget that Stewart Kerr made a vital save at 0-0 – it was an unbelievable stop from Brian Laudrup. Someone said afterwards that it didn’t look as though Rangers were fighting. But from where I was standing they gave it as much as we did.
“Once we went 2-0 up we made sure we kept possession and stuck to the task Tommy Burns set us. This has given us a great lift. You just have to look at the crowd to see that.”
CELTIC CAPTAIN PAUL McSTAY: “We had the self-belief we needed. Beating Rangers was a hurdle we had to overcome. We’ve now got to believe we can go on to win the Scottish Cup AND the Championship.
“The pressure was on us to turn this thing around. We put in a lot of effort and our attitude was bang on. We went ahead early on and contained them well after that. It was a double hurdle – to get into the semis and also to get rid of that jinx.”
COMING SOON FROM DAVID POTTER ON CELTIC STAR BOOKS…
Since writing this, I have had another look at the film, and undeniably, I have been too soft on the referee and Craig Moore. Have another look at that tackle in the first half. Straight red and no argument!