The official Celtic account tweeted a video of Scott Brown’s famous ‘Broony’ celebration today. It was uploaded to mark nine years since the Celtic icon’s finest moment occurred, in the Scottish Cup match a Ibrox on 6 February 2011.
#Onthisday ‘The Broony’ was born \o/ 😎 👏 @ScottBrown8 pic.twitter.com/iLvOSvJWmo
— Celtic Football Club (@CelticFC) February 6, 2020
The video triggered other Scottish Cup memories on this day, strangely none more so than a routine 3-0 win over Dunfermline Athletic in 2005! The match seems worth recounting, for Celtic are once more in Scottish Cup action this weekend and just as in 2005, the Bhoys will be playing on another dreaded plastic pitch, against Clyde.
The Hoops travelled to Fife on 6 February 2005 in good form. Indeed, Celtic were unbeaten in all competitions since 20 November 2004; no mean feat considering fixtures were played against Rangers, AC Milan and away to Barcelona in this period. The Celts sought to extend their domestic winning streak to ten games and named a strong starting line-up, Stephane Henchoz replacing the injured Jackie McNamara, the only changed made as the Swiss defender was handed his Celtic debut:
Douglas, Henchoz, Balde, Varga, Laursen, Petrov (Lambert 77), Lennon, Thompson (Juninho Paulista 57), McGeady, Sutton, Hartson (Wallace 75)
Celtic survived an early scare after 20 seconds when keeper Rab Douglas came charging out of his box only to miss his kick, but Dunfermline failed to capitalise. The Pars were swiftly made to pay when Sutton squared the ball for Hartson to score the simplest of tap-ins in the eighth minute.
Hartson returned the favour two minutes later, when he volleyed against the crossbar and Sutton was on hand to head the rebound into an empty net.
Dunfermline shut up shop thereafter, presumably seeking to get to the break without a further deficit. They would, however, lose a killer third goal in the 43rd minute as a long ball caused confusion in the Dunfermline defence. The ball came off the heads of both Scott Wilson and Andrius Skerla before falling nicely for Hartson to fire low past Stillie for his second of the game.
Celtic took their foot off the gas in the second half, but Stillie was called upon to keep out a Petrov effort, before producing a magnificent reflex save to tip a Sutton header on to the bar.
Despite a comfortable victory, Martin O’Neill made it clear that he was unhappy with the artifical surface. The Celtic boss also stated that the plastic pitch had been the reason that he did not include new signing, Craig Bellamy, in the squad over fears that he may aggravate an old knee injury. In response, Dunfermline’s Chairman, John Yorkston, told BBC Radio Scotland: “We’ve not had any injuries because of the pitch and as far as I’m aware no opposition teams have either. In fact, Bobo Balde’s probably caused more injuries this season than our pitch!”
Upon hearing the comments, O’Neill was outraged: “For a chairman to say that is in pretty poor taste. He should be hauled up for that,” the Celtic manager said. “The surface is poor. It’s not just me that’s saying it. Alex McLeish and all other visiting managers have said it. You can’t play football on it.”
The row erupted over a few days before the SFA stepped in, asking Yorkston to explain himself. “It was meant as a joke and everybody who heard the interview would have taken it as a joke,” he said. “Bobo Balde just happened to be passing when I was doing the interview. It could have been any player.” The claim that his remarks were tongue in cheek, though stopping short of an apology, appeared to dissipate the matter.
15 years later, Celtic still don’t tend to prosper on plastic pitches. Although, the Hoops would settle for a similar result at Clyde on Sunday.
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