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19th July 1967 There were several areas in their bodies where players felt the problems of pre-season training. For those who had not done anything at all during the summer, there were blisters to contend with and these could come along at any time. In fact, in my own case, I could be three-quarters of …
The first week was nearly at an end and judging by the voluble chat in the dressing room, we were all surviving pretty well. Oh! there were the usual complaints. The sprinters complained that there was too much long stuff; the middle distance runners objected to the amount of short runs; and those who did …
26th July 1967 Training was going on as usual. Tough would be the word to describe it but then why wouldn’t it be. We were all part of a team that had won every competition the previous season and we knew that the management – and fans – would expect a repeat performance in …
Read more “26th July 1967 – Fitness Levels Rise as Man in Black arrives at Ibrox”
29th July 1967 While training at Barrowfield continued in the usual tough fashion, news came in from Ibrox that the deal with Orjan Persson – currently with Dundee United – was off and that the winger had returned to his home in the town of Smogen in west Sweden. Frankly, there had been so much …
I did mention in a previous piece that all the guys were getting a bit annoyed that no actual matches seem to have been arranged before the friendly with Spurs on the 5th August and possibly those noises got though to the top brass as it was announced that two games had been arranged for …
After the ‘closed-doors’ match against Albion Rovers at Cliftonhill in midweek, training for the next couple of days was quite relaxed. All the hard work had been done and now we could look forward to some competitive action in front of a big crowd, even if the first match had been designated as a ‘friendly’. …
Read more “5th August 1967: Celtic v Tottenham Hotspur – Friendly”
7th August Quite surprisingly, for a match between a team from Scotland and one from England which ended in a 3-3 draw, the press over the weekend was fairly complimentary about Celtic’s performance at Hampden – Celtic – You Were Great! ‘Altogether, the match was a great advertisement for the new season and the …
Read more “12th August 1967: Celtic v Dundee United League Cup”
Monday 14th August The players were quite delighted in the immediate aftermath of the opening match against Dundee United. As has been mentioned before, we had rather struggled against them the previous season and to start the new season’s League Cup campaign with a victory against the Terrors was a great boost. Funnily enough, after …
17th August The press was still going on about the Old Firm match of the previous evening, most of it in rapturous tones. This paragraph is representative of the overall message; ‘The skills on display, the enthusiasm shown by the two sets of players and maybe most of all the splendid behaviour of the crowd …
Monday 21st August In the evening papers, there were one story and one headline which caught the eye. The first was a story about the Boss – ‘New English First Division club Coventry City are said to be ready to offer Jock Stein a salary of £10,000 a year to manage their club in succession …
Read more “22nd August 1967 Partick Thistle v Celtic – Glasgow Cup”