SENTINELCELTS



Morning,all.

By popular request,JIMBO67 recalls an infamous night in our history,a black mark against The Beautiful Game.

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The matches you are about to read of were played almost 49 years ago.  I have tried to use my own memory where I can but, inevitably, did consult the Celtic Wiki to check some facts. There is pretty good, colour, footage of the game at Celtic Park but not much from the game in Madrid is to be found on YouTube, whilst reports of the match in the Celtic histories I have read are , to me, surprisingly brief and fit into an overall narrative that Celtic had been in decline since May 1970. The Not The View article reproduced on the Wiki is as good as anything I’ve read on it.

Celtic has not played more important matches since.

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The 1973/4 season had been a mixed one for Celtic. Bobby Murdoch’s departure to Middlesbrough was surprising, David Hay’s transfer request remained unresolved all season whilst injuries of varying degrees of severity meant that George Connelly, Danny McGrain and Ally Hunter missed all or much of the final quarter of the season, whilst the hellish injury to Brian McLaughlin in the second league game of the season proved to be hugely disappointing for Celtic and life changingly tragic for the player himself. Form was patchy and the league cup was lost in disappointing fashion on a wretchedly miserable December afternoon.

But by the 10th of April 1974, Celtic was cruising to a ninth league title in a row and through to the Scottish Cup final where Dundee United were not expected to cause us too much trouble. We had beaten FC Basle in the quarter-final on an epic night to reach the semi-finals of the European Cup. We were still a very good team and McNeill, Hay, Johnstone, Hood, Murray, Lennox, Deans, Wilson, McGrain and Dalglish very good players and although there were some feelings that Jim Brogan and Tom Callaghan were past their bests ,they were hardly liabilities. Pat McCluskey was not as refined a left-half as George Connelly and possibly too slow but he worked hard, was tough and at times he could play a bit. Denis Connaghan -in goal because Hunter was injured (and with confidence permanently lowered after dropping a clanger in a World Cup qualifier versus Czechoslovakia) – was never likely to be a permanent solution but he was, in April 1974, playing well.

Teams which reached the semi-finals of the European Cup then, as now, were good but none of the four qualifiers would have had the others quaking at the prospect of facing them. Bayern Munchen was favourite largely because Maier, Beckenbauer and Gerd Muller played for them, not because they were a particularly good team in the way that the deposed European Champions, Ajax, had been. Ujpest Dosza had knocked us out the previous season after catching us cold early in the second leg but we had won on their pitch in March 1972 – they had, like us in truth, made a bit of a meal of some ordinary opposition to get as far as they did and the Hungarian side was thought to be past its best. The line-up was completed by Atletico Madrid who’d beaten one or two good sides on the way but which had also failed to win any of its home legs and although second in La Liga was well behind Cruyff’s Barcelona side. We thought we would beat them.

Not much else was known about Atletico Madrid. The victory over Red Star, themselves conquerors of Liverpool, in the quarterfinals suggested quality, but there was at least one report that hinted their style of play had been dour and prone to time wasting in the games with the Yugoslavs. Atletico’s coach was Juan Carlos Lorenzo who had been in Argentina’s boss at the 1966 World Cup. This set one or two alarm bells ringing given that Alf Ramsay had called that team ‘animals’ and also because Celtic’s only previous encounter with Argentinean football had been with Racing Club but Lorenzo was very much charm personified in an interview he gave with the Celtic View published the week before the first leg, which dampened down some of the fears of a repeat of the 1967 debacle.

My dad and I got stand tickets for the match. The crush at the Basle game had been considerable and as I was small and thin – and had missed Stevie Murray’s decisive goal after a guy near us nearly set himself and me on fire when lighting up just as the cross into the box for that goal was  made- so we had queued early before a game with Dumbarton to get those tickets or else I would not get to go. The crowd limit for Celtic Park had been 75000 but the police ordered a cut in the crowd to 73000 as the crushing had been so bad at the Basle game (crowd given as 71000 so go figure the logic there.) Our seats were in the top stand and we seemed to be surrounded by priests. A different world.

The evening of 10th April 1974 was fine but cool,  and I noticed as the teams walked onto the pitch that a couple of the visiting team wear wearing gloves. The ground was very noisy and there had been some impressive displays of scarves during the singing of You’ll Never Walk Alone. The most common Celtic scarf had by now become the bar scarf instead of the plainer green ones of a few years before and the sight of thousands of them being displayed covering those who raised them like a blanket was both fairly new and very striking. Danny McGrain had been injured the previous month and was only a sub. Hay playing at full-back meant we might be a bit thin in midfield.

Celtic attacked the Celtic end in the first half and the game quickly settled into a pattern it stayed in until it ended. Constant attacking by Celtic of a packed red and white defence which seemed to have no qualms about breaking up Celtic’s attacks with fouls. Not just trips and body checks but FOULS intended to injure. Jimmy Johnstone was so fouled a couple of times quite badly in the opening minutes, and at least one of these fouls saw a yellow card brandished. Ten minutes in Celtic seemed to have scored when Kenny Dalglish finished off a Harry Hood cut back. It might have been offside we thought but apparently Hood had cut the ball back from over the line. From my seat that was rubbish. Had the goal stood as it probably should have, the course of the game would have changed but instead Atletico carried on as they had. Jimmy Johnstone was kicked repeatedly but Kenny Dalglish and Harry Hood- Celtic’s next two most skilful starters- were treated shabbily too.  Jim Brogan was booked for rugby tackling one of their players which got a few cheers but the signal seemed to go out from the dugout for Celtic to ‘keep the heid.’ Celtic’s discipline on the field was very good in the face of not just fouling but spitting and the only other Celtic player booked was Dixie Deans after a challenge on the keeper who feigned injury. Dixie was taken off not long afterwards and replaced by Paul Wilson, although the more experienced Bobby Lennox might have been the better pick.

The first half had been bad, but the second was much worse – one challenge on Jinky by their number 4 ( I think his name was Benegas) over on the Jungle side was truly vicious, and yet still the ref, Turkey’s Dogan Babacan , saw fit to give only a yellow card. Eventually Babacan sent three of them off in the space of about 18 minutes beginning just after the hour mark.  Reuben Ayala was first to go. The fast, skilful Argentinean winger went for two bookable offences – the second of which, a foul on Hay, might well have merited a straight red- then his fellow Argentine , the left back Diaz – who had also been Racing’s left back- went for his second yellow after a really appalling foul on wee Jimmy which the wee man was lucky to be able to walk after. A sub, Quique, went for a routine foul on Jinky-which he followed up with a kick of Jinky off the ball. Celtic played against 8 men for 10 minutes or so but could not score. We had in flashes played well in the first half but with Jinky crocked- he did not play our next match- and our best finisher removed, we lost impetus as the game progressed-although both Dalglish and Hood maybe should have scored with headers. Celtic had been well and truly knocked of its stride by Atletico’s style ,but with Murdoch gone and Connelly injured. our play had lacked finesse and variety. 

Atletico committed 50 fouls in the game. 

The ground had been in turmoil for much of the game- other than the occasional fire and brimstone visiting priest I had never seen clerical anger until this match- but quietened quite a bit in the closing minutes when it dawned that Atletico’s plan was going to work. The final whistle however brought a crescendo of boos and whistles and I noticed in front of me the entire travelling party who sat to the right of the Celtic dignitaries at the front of the rear stand, standing as one and applauding their team like party loyalists in Red Square applauding a speech by Stalin. And then the highlight of the night – a serious fracas right in front of the tunnel involving several players of both teams. Tom Callaghan seemed to be taking on several of the visitors on the perimeter wall of the front stand-which was a surprise given that we knew the Celt to be an affable and laidback character from meeting him occasionally in Bishopbriggs. David Hay seemed to be having a less than friendly encounter with one of their players whom he’d knocked over. The police waded in and ushered everybody up the tunnel where discussions continued. The noise from the crowd  would have woken the dead, whilst everybody, including those priests around me, seemed to be close to completely losing control. However,  looking back, the biggest surprise of the night was how well behaved the crowd was. No bottles were thrown, nobody attempted to run on and assault anybody and there were none of the then usual impromptu punch ups amongst the fans either. There was a feeling that if one fan had run on, thousands would have followed and that Atletico would have been lucky to get out of Glasgow alive. But instead the crowd supported the team, howled their disapproval,and after the rammy at the end left in sullen, simmering disbelief. 

I remember we went back to the car, and a guy getting into the back and asked if we’d mind giving him a run to his work. He was a complete stranger but in more innocent times it was a case of where my dad could drop him. The three of us wondered whether Celtic would withdraw or UEFA would ban Atletico. On that last point we were all agreed that UEFA should chuck them out but would not. More innocent times perhaps but not entirely uncynical. The guy got out the car near the Royal Infirmary. I never saw him again, and Celtic has not played another European Cup semi-final match at Parkhead since.

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UEFA fined Atletico around £14000, which was quite a big fine for the era but hardly a crippling one. Celtic declined to take any tickets for supporters to go to the match in the Vicente Calderon Stadium and for a time there was talk of the game being shown live. Celtic travelled, and on arrival, death threats were issued against Jimmy Johnstone and Jock Stein, which as well as causing real fear in the Celtic party made many of us at home thinking that if we did not withdraw, we might be better off losing. There had been talk of the game being shown live on television, but instead it would be broadcast ‘as live’ shortly after its end. The game was broadcast on the radio and we listened to David Francey and some English commentator.

We seemed to play well in the first half, and as with our trip to the Bernabeu six years later, missed a couple of decent chances at nil-nil- one by Dalglish at the start of the second half would possibly have had an increasingly edgy home crowd turn on its own team. Even on the radio you could sense the crowd was getting  increasingly uneasy. The game turned away from us after that miss though, and by the time the match entered its closing stages, extra-time and penalties seemed our only hope. It was an excruciating  listen. Atletico scored twice in the last dozen minutes to put us out of our misery. We watched the recording of the game and the only thing I remember of it was that when a loan voice shouted out ‘CEL-TIC’ the crowd booed. The cheats had won. 

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I can never forgive far less forget Atletico Madrid.  I never warmed to Bayern’s rather boring team of the mid-70s but jumped round the room when their defender Schwarzenbeck equalised with the last kick of the ball of the 1974 final and exulted when the Germans scored 4 without reply in the replay. 26 years later they were relegated from Spain’s topflight and I cheered, and I cheered too when Real equalised in the last minute of a Champions’ League final to deprive them of victory. They were a really horrible team in 1974 and have never seemed to offer any sort of apology for the despicable way they played on the 10th of April 1974. Hell mend them.

I can acknowledge now that Celtic was in decline by 1974 – football was changing, and it is hard to think of anybody less suited to steering Celtic through this changing world than Desmond White. That decline might have been slowed had we reached another European Cup final – a final I believe that we were capable of winning. We’ll never know but although we clinched the league three days after the Madrid Match, won the Cup a week later and then lifted both the Dryburgh Cup and League Cup in the opening three months of the next season, there was a clearer realisation for a teenager like me that our best days were in the past. Celtic has had some good teams since 1974 and had some great nights at both home and abroad in Europe in that time, but Celtic has never again occupied a high  seat in the European hierarchy , never had as good a team as it had when it walked onto the field to play Atletico Madrid. They pushed Celtic off the cliff.