Celtic Saints and Sinners, from the wonderful Tommy Burns to Judas

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The Celtic Star

·6 dicembre 2024

Celtic Saints and Sinners, from the wonderful Tommy Burns to Judas

Celtic on this Day – Tommy Burns makes an emotional last appearance for Celtic on a freezing cold night. Tommy throws his boots into the Jungle in one last gesture to the Celtic support who had chanted his name throughout the game. Not a dry eye in the Jungle…

Tommy Burns makes an emotional last appearance in the hoops on a freezing cold night on 6 December 1989. Photo The Celtic Wiki

6 December 2001

06/12/01 UEFA Cup, Third Round, second leg. Celtic v Valencia. Celtic striker Henrik Larsson scores the only goal of the game. Photo The Celtic Wiki

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Celtic 1-0 Valencia. Following Martin O’Neill’s side finishing third in the Champions League group stages, Celtic entered the UEFA Cup in the 2001/2002 European campaign. Beaten 1-0 at the Mestalla Stadium two weeks prior in the first leg, a big performance and result was required to make it to the last 16 of the competition.

Henrik Larsson’s curling strike on the stroke of half-time was the only goal in normal time. Valencia won on penalties 5-4 as Larsson blazed over with a horrendous spot kick, Petrov completely missed the target with his attempt from 12 yards, and Valgaeren, despite having two opportunities due to Canizwres [Valencia’s goalkeeper] being adjudged to have been off his line for the first, missed his retake in the vital sudden-death penalty.

Although Celtic were beaten, It was a special evening, the atmosphere in the stadium was electric, but the Hoops did not do enough to go through on the night. The Spaniards would defeat Swiss side Sarvette in the next round but would be knocked out by Italian giants Inter Milan in the quarter-finals.

6 December 1989

Tommy Burns makes an emotional last appearance in the hoops on a freezing cold night on 6 December 1989. Photo The Celtic Wiki

Tommy Burns’ last appearance in a Hoops jersey. Celtic defeated Ajax 1-0 in a friendly as Tommy made an emotional last outing for his boyhood club. The veteran midfielder would join Scottish Second Division club Kilmarnock after a 14 year-spell at Parkhead. Famously after the game, Burns threw his boots into the jungle as a final farewell whilst the Celtic supporters adoringly chanted his name throughout the match. On the encounter with the Dutch titleholders itself, it was Celtic’s want-away slipper Roy Aitken who netted the friendlies solitary goal.

Post-match, speaking to the media, Tommy Burns said, “it was one of the most emotional moments of my life. I’ve been heartbroken for three days just thinking about playing my last game for Celtic.”

6 December 2016

Man City v Celtic, 6 December 2016, Photo Vagelis Georgariou

Eight years ago today, Manchester City 1-1 Celtic. Brendan Rodgers’ men travelled down to the Etihad for their dead rubber Champions League clash with Pep Guardiola’s high-flying City side. City played a second-rate team worth just shy of £112 million, making it all the more credible that Celtic went down to Manchester and competed incredibly well for the entire match.

Paddy Roberts scores for Celtic.Man City v Celtic, 6 December 2016, Photo Vagelis Georgariou

Patrick Roberts, who was on loan at Celtic from City scored a typical Paddy goal weaving his way past a few defenders and then striking past experienced journeyman Willy Caballero. Two draws against a squad worth around £1 billion in the space of three months was an accolade for this Celtic team who had spent the last two seasons lurking and serially underperforming in the Europa League.

6 December 1986

38 years ago today, Celtic 2-0 Dundee. Davie Hay’s side headed into this match looking for a response to a 1-0 loss at Tynecastle three days prior. Fortunately for Hay, he had Judas to call upon who grabbed a double to secure three points at Paradise in front of a sparse crowd of 19,000. Sunday Post in their column the day after wrote, “if there’s an art to winning while playing badly, Celtic on this display appear to have perfected it. The league leaders had one of those days when nothing, except the result, of course, really went right for them.”

There were murmurings around this period that AC Milan had shown a keen interest in Judas and were preparing a bid, but nothing materialised. We’ll pass on showing you photographs of the Celtic goalscorer, if you don’t mind.

Conor Spence