Some roses emerge from the manure? (Us … 1 Them … 2)

However, unlike yer homosexual television viewers or programme makers - all power to their elbow, they make some bl**dy good stuff and anyone who has a problem with someone because of their sexuality is just a twat/knob - I think the celtic faithful and their team need to be reminded every now and then that they are, basically, found to be rather annoying by a large section of the football-watching public.

As undoubtedly momentous as their achievements have been over the last two seasons in the UEFA Cup, the “who’s like us - och, we’re all just good-natured matey-types” garbage which goes along with it is nauseating in the extreme. As is the sudden amnesia surrounding Scottish footballing history.

Dundee united have defeated Barcelona twice in the Nou Camp and twice at Tannadice in European competition. In the 1960/61 Fairs Cup Hibs managed a 4-4 draw in Catalunya before doing them 3-2 at Easter Road - and this was when Baca were reigning champions of Spain as well as, strangely enough, on their way to the European Cup final of the same season.

Even Celtic fans themselves have been genuinely insulted by some of the media proclamations this week. Claiming this was their club’s greatest ever European result was simply a joke. Even I know that doing the Leeds of 1970 home and away in the European Cup semis or beating Inter in the 67 final are far greater victories than which happened on Thursday night.

Then there’s all the cheeky wee jokes - some of which are actually quite good - “What does a Rangers fan do after his team’s put Barcelona out of Europe? Switches off his Playstation!”. To be honest, when I first heard this ditty, I half expected it to end with a sanctimonious diatribe on how, when winning the Cup-Winners’ Cup final of 72, our fans “celebrated” by indulging in a running battle with Franco’s polis (not that the Generalissimo’s finest gave us much choice, mind ye!) but the loveable Celtic rogues simply got pished and annoyed the loal elderley population by looking for a kiss and cuddle which the Daily Record could snap and print as an example of their general cuddliness.

Anyone who lives with the Celtic support, as we do on this website, knows that victory does, in fact, bring out the worst in large sections of the hooped faithful. They’re fine when the cameras are on them - thus all the beach balls and sombreros today (oh, stop it, you jovial jesters!) - but give them a keyboard or a phone and a bit of anonymity and the aforementoned sanctimonious crap begins. Some actually wanted Rangers to clap them onto the pitch today - winning is never enough for them - and by the time this suggestion had gone round a few e-mails and phone-ins, the louder empty vessels were whipping themselves into a frenzy of invented indignation.

This inability to just have a good old wind-up, an honest slagging of your derby rival, but instead begin to convince yourself of the need for moral outrage, is probably The most depressing aspect of any Celtic triumph. Of course the sensible Celtic fans, and I still trust that the vast majority are sensible, can’t be heard - they’re too busy feeling happy to get all anti. But their silence leaves the airwaves and websites free for their less stable friends. So we have to listen to the kind of p*sh which, for instance, had eejits professing disgust and incredulity that John Kennedy wasn’t named in the Scotland squad to face Romania next Wednesday in light of his undoubtedly mammoth performance against La Liga’s form side. The fact that the Scotland squad was announced BEFORE Kennedy had the game of his life in Catalunya did not seem to register. (Anyway, he’s in it now after all this weekend’s call-offs and, believe you me, there’s plenty better reasons to be outraged at Vogts.)

So, having kept it all to myself since Thursday, today was all about letting off steam. “Applaud them onto the pitch”? Certainly. If Celtic win the UEFA Cup I’d actually quite like to see Rangers applaud them onto the field. It’d be deserved then. But I don’t remember them applauidng us onto the pitch when we played them at parkhead three days after doing Leeds United at Elland Road to kncok the English Champions out of the European Cup and ourselves become the first British side to qualify for the Champions League. Of course not.

What do Rangers fans do after they put Barcelona out of Europe? Having never drawn Barcelona in European competition it’s hard to say. But I’ll bet it’d be much the same as what Celtic fans do after winning a single point away from home in six Champions League attempts. Or maybe it’ll be like what Celtic fans did after they beat Monaco, PSV Eindhoven, Bayer Leverkusen or Parma in European competition? Oh no - that was us, wasn’t it. Keep forgetting Celtic hadn’t made it past Xmas in Europe for two decades before last year.

Bitter? Oh AYE! And today was, as I say, about letting our visitors know that there’s at least one part of town where they will never be seen through emerald-tinted specs. And until the final quarter of an hour, the barrage of verbal abuse I meted out to Scotland’s UEFA cup quater-finalists was the only moment of enjoyment in this match. How fu**ing sad is that!

Five in a row in any competition. Three in a row at Ibrox in the league. That’s a pretty disgraceful record of losses for The Teds in Old Firm matches. We huffed and puffed with only slightly more conviction than the Scottish Cup quarter-final at the piggery but ultimately we were simply outclassed when it mattered.

I printed my prefered starting line-up in a wee rant on this site earlier in the week (the one below this on the home page). Frank de Boer’s absence meant it could never be the team Eck actually fielded but it irks slightly to see we FINISHED the game with the line-up I’d suggested (sans Frank) and it was in those closing stages, with Burke, Thompson and Ricksen on the park, that we looked our most dangerous.

Did we only begin to look like a team in the last quarter of an hour because Celtic - only one change from their exertions in Spain - were tiring? Would Burke, perhaps not yet fully match-fit himself, have been as effective if he’d played from the start against a smelltic side which still buzzing on UEFA Cup adrenaline at kick-off time? We’ll never know.

What we can be sure of, however, is Burke not only brought Rangers back into the game by dint of his drive, determination, energy and sheer skill but that his contribution immediately injected life into all his team-mates. Hutton, who excelled even when switched to centre-half after Bob Malcolm’s injury, fed off Burke’s raw commitment and upped his own input.

It’s tempting to make too much of a glaringly obvious comparison I’ve been making since the moment we scored our goal (Thank GOD we actually got a goal this time!) in the 82nd minute today. De Boer had two dreadful corners from the Govan Stand-side in the second half, neither of which cleared the first Celtic man and the second of which led to their winning goal. Yet Chrissey Burke switched wings to take two corners from the same spot, the first of which cuased havoc among celtic’s gargantuan defence and led immediately to a scond Burke corner whiich he put straight onto Thompson’s head for our first goal in four games against our derby rivals.

In the bloodlust atmos of an Old Firm match this had me demanding McLeish should gut the team of anyone on a high salary or even those in possession of a non-UK passport (except Bob Malcolm who, of course, holds passports for most Axis Of Evil countries as a result of his undercover SAS work). De Boer may have provided one or two more obvious moments of failure and J-Lo-ish petulance against which the all-out effort of Burke, Hutton and Thompson seemed far more genuine and desirable. But when he came back deep - as he so often had to - and helped out the midfield, his quick-witedness, composure and assured touch guaranteed we could at least keep the ball in Celtic’s half for reasonable periods of time. It wasn’t always glaringly obvious, but de Boers’ experience was at the heart of the dull positives. We need a sturdy skelton which we can flesh out with raw talent.

Michael Ball’s sheer inability to execute the basics of defending in the 20th minute did, however, back up my reactionary Cheap Scots - v - Expensive “Foreigners” theory. I mean, what the f**k, Gers?! The warning signs were there on Tuesday when Dunfermline’s consolation goal came from an unchallenged header around our six yard box. Larsson is undoubtedly an international-class striker but gifting him a rare Ibrox goal as a going-away present is not our job. Klos is left stranded on the floor as another Celtic player decides to square to Larsson rather than shooting for himself, then okay - but we don’t fail to get off the ground when he’s standing right behind us!

The second Celtic goal was a case of Larsson squaring the ball to Pearson rather than shooting for himself band Klos wasn’t stranded on the deck so much as making a great initial save at Pearson’s feet. But a man who’ll be proud to wear the three lions on his chest and the St George’s cross on his sleeve - Alan Thompson - followed up to nick the rebound in with the aid of a deflection. A loyal Englishman taking the applause of the Celtic support - the same celtic support who were singing “Whose the fenian in the blue!” while the Rangers support bemoaned the fact a team adored by Catholic, Republican seperatists had failed to beat Celtic on Thursday night. It’s a sad, confused thing an Old Firm game. No-one even knows what they’re hating.

Me? I was mostly hating the fact Rangers were being so clearly outclassed in the key parts of the match. A sign that yer number’s up is when the opposition score from one of your corners. That second goal of Thompsons’s derived from one of de Boer’s foppish attempts at delivering a ball into the opposition penalty area and three subsequent equally pathetic attempts at regaining the ball. Khizanishvili dispossessed Pearson on the counter-attack but his poor control gited possession to Larsson. At 2-0 it was all over.

It could have been 3-0, but for Varga proving he can only score with his head by hitting the bar from zero yards out and a quite breathtaking save from Klos which, as with Marshall’s touch of a deflection onto Celtic’s post in the first half, when I was at the game I thought was a near miss by the outfield players involved.

Celtic are a very useful unit. As I’ve said before on this page, this is the best parkhead side I’ve ever seen and we shouldn’t be too harsh on our team for losing to one of O’Neill’s line-ups. The physical presence is the obvious thing but it’s not even half of their game. They shut down space incredibly well and for large portions of the game made us look totally inept because all we could do was knock the ball about infront of them, ususally in our own half. There was no-where to go at times and this led disturbingly to a few voices of discontent with their own side among the Bluenoses. I can understand the frustration - I feel it as much as anyone - but I can never understand slagging your own team so loudly DURING an Old Firm match.

Thompsosn’s determination and ability to get between Balde and Kennedy to score our goal and his total lack of respect for anything in green-and-white - his determination to nail Sutton and Larsson - all bode well. He, Burke , Hutton and even Rae weren’t scared by Celtic’s talents so much as annoyed and angered by them. We want guys on the pitch who reflect the Bears’ attitude. We want players who embody that feeling of “How dare these bas**rds come here and think they can p*ss all over us”. If Celtic are going to win themn make sure they bl**dy earn it and that they leave our ground under no illusions as to just how difficult it is to beat Rangers when yer wearing green-and-white hops. That’s not been happening lately and is actually nothing to do with a need to “go native” - Try telling Brian Laudrup, Mark Hateley, Graham Roberts, Terry Butcher, Mark Walters etc that the never really uderstood what Old Firm games meant to the Bears! - it just seems that almost all our Scots currently posses the pride and desire to apply themselves correctly.

Moore only looked up for it when we went 2-0 down and he started putting the boot in. Nice at the time but reckless in the long run. The young Scots were all ready for aggro if it came their way and ready to stat it if it helped the cause but they were primarily just up for getting stuck into the task of beating Celtic.

It didn’t happen today but McLeish has no excuses now for leaving the Scots (except Allan McGregor) on the bench when we visit parkhead after the SPL split. Cetic are too good this season but if we act on the positives in today’s performance we can ensure it’s the last campaign for a while in which they’re untouchable.

GERS: Klos, Hutton, Khizanishvili (Burke 59), Moore, Ball, Rae, Malcolm (Ricksen 80), Hughes, Lovenkrands (Thompson 66), Mols, Ronald de Boer.

UNUSED SUBS: McGregor, Berg.

CARDED: Lovenkrands, Moore.

SCORED: Thompson (82).

CROWD: 49,909

REFEREE: Kenny Clark (a strange game)

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Published:
03.28.04 / 10pm
Category:
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