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Coming Home Losing to Liverpool was a shattering blow. It did not matter whether one team or another was the better side, we were out! Certainly, the referee’s choice to deny Bobby Lennox a goal due to a debatable offside decision by a linesman was heartbreaking for every Celtic fan. From where I was sitting, …
Read more “23rd April 1966: Scottish Cup Final Celtic v Rangers – Part One”
Seamill On the Thursday morning, two days before the Cup Final, a Celtic squad – including myself – headed for Seamill and preparation for the big day. The atmosphere was good, there was a lot of banter and the boys especially enjoyed the fine weather, absolutely perfect for the first paddle in the sea of …
Read more “23rd April 1966: Scottish Cup Final Celtic v Rangers – Part Two”
Press Reaction Over the weekend following the 0-0 draw in the Scottish Cup final, the headlines in the press blasted out various thoughts ;- It Must Still Be Celtic
Build-up I did as I had been told – something my wife says I am not very good at – had a long lie, a light lunch then reported at Celtic Park early afternoon for a wee session, some light running, a few sprints, nae sign of a ball at all! The atmosphere was quite …
Read more “27th April 1966 Scottish Cup Final Replay – Part Two”
Reserve Match I know it seems hard to believe but on the evening of the Scottish Cup final replay, the Celtic reserves had a match at Celtic Park. They played St Mirren in the league and had a convincing 7-0 win, the team being Fallon, Halpin, McCarron, Cattenach, Cushley, O’Neill, H Quinn, Sweeney, J Quinn, …
Read more “30th April 1966: Morton v Celtic League – Part One”
The Build-Up As there was a reserve match on the Friday night against Rangers (see Preview), training on the Thursday evening was pretty light, although all the guys wanted to know the inside story of the defeat and I had to talk for most of the night. It was hard work! I was only getting …
Read more “30th April 1966: Morton v Celtic League – Part Two”
Tension As a part-timer, I was in the slightly awkward position of only seeing my first-team colleagues on a match day, so I was unable to say with any certainty how they were feeling about Celtic’s drive for the league title. From my own point of view, though, I was very definitely aware of the …
Read more “4th May 1966: Celtic v Dunfermline League – Part One”
The Build-up On the morning of the match against Dunfermline, I was at the Dental Hospital for a few hours, then got ready to push off home for a rest and a bite to eat. The Dental Hospital at that time was in Renfrew Street, one road up from – and parallel to – Sauchiehall …
Read more “4th May 1966: Celtic v Dunfermline League – Part Two”
Press Reaction On the Thursday after the Dunfermline match, the main story in nearly all the papers was that Celtic were now almost certain winners of the league title. On this particular topic, there were no dissenters among the press corps but manager Jock Stein was not as convinced as others : “what if Motherwell …
Read more “7th May 1966: Motherwell v Celtic League – Part One”
Pre-Match In some ways, the pressure was off. Unless we had some kind of disastrous performance against Motherwell and lost heavily, the League was ours. We all knew that was the case but no one was thinking along those lines ; the Boss had already reminded us that he expected us to end the …
Read more “7th May 1966: Motherwell v Celtic League – Part Two”