Today’s photo of the day looks back to a bygone era of football, when the fearsome terracing of the Jungle would be jam packed for matches.
The chosen image dates back to the 1960s and appears to show the famous stand packed for a Celtic V Rangers match.
The Jungle in the 1960s pic.twitter.com/fsiaFCBw32
— Liam Kelly (@cfcliamk96) December 21, 2021
There has been a bit of investigation into the image, as you can see by reading the thread in the embedded Tweet (above), as it is unclear as to which fixture the photograph relates to.
Could it be a Glasgow Cup tie in 1965? A League match in September 1966? Or another League occasion? The investigation goes on, but I think we can all agree that a full Jungle was a magnificent spectacle.
I would say that game would either be a League Cup Section game or Glasgow Cup..because the crowd gaps are too big for it to have been a League game..the crowd is quite sparse in some areas..which was never my experience in the Jungle against the Huns!
This photo is from the Jim Rodger collection. It was taken from the League match at Celtic Park on 10 September 1960 which Rangers won 5-1. Crowd was only around the 40,000 mark. The previous Saturday there had been 60,000 there when the teams met in a League Cup section match. Celtic had led the section and with 2 home games to go looked as if they were going to quailfy. However they lost them both. A draw in the last game with Rangers would have been enough but after taking an early lead they lost 2 second half goals and failed once again. There was a lot of trouble after that game and talk of postponing this league game. That plus disillusionment among the Celtic support probably contributed to the low crowd. You also have to remember that in those days the crowds at Old Firm games were virtually half and half around the stadium. The fans you will see in the far right of that photo will be Rangers fans. What a lot of people forget or don’t realise was that the Jungle was not in those days the “Fearsome Terracing” it would become later. The singing and passion came from the Celtic End. My young brother recalls being taken to his first Old Firm game in 1968 by a “sensible uncle” as I was deemed too irresponsible because I went to the Celtic End. To make it a less hazardous occasion our uncle took him to the Jungle. It was not long after that that the Jungle started to become a bit more popular with the “choir” However that was the “new” Jungle as the TV gantry was in there and fans realised that the singing in there was bettter picked up on the microphones. It would still be a few years before the Jungle would be fully occupied by Celtic fans but the Jungle as it appears in that photo would never have had an Old Firm game without Rangers fans in it , and it would not have been considered the place where the more passionate fans went.
Thanks for this Mike, this is really interesting. I knew the Jungle wasn’t always the main terracing for atmosphere, but didn’t realise this photo was as early as that. This is great info
I had many great times in the jungle especially European nights playing ajax in 1982 springs to mind when we scored you’d lift your feet and when things settled down you’d ended up in another part of the jungle