Celtic Slang | About Celtic | Celtic’s Foundation | Tony Mowbray
Details
Name: The Huddle
Reference to: On-field pre-match team talk & bonding
Derivations: In the stands it’s the ‘Poznan‘ (name most commonly used outwith of Scotland)
Originated: Kickers Emden 2-0 Celtic, Friendly, 23 July 1995
Summary
| “I don’t like to put a patent on it. But I take a great sense of pride in it. It was nothing to do with my wife, as has been wrongly reported. It came out of adversity. The Celtic players needed to show real unity and togetherness. We needed to show the supporters we cared.” Tony Mowbray (originator of The Huddle at Celtic) |
The Huddle is said to have originated in 1892 at Gallaudet University, Washington D.C.. Its originator was a deaf man named Paul Hubbard, who played quarterback for Gallaudet University’s Bisons football team. At the time, Gallaudet was the world’s only Liberal Arts University for students who were deaf or hard of hearing. On 8th April 1864, President Lincoln granted authorisation for Gallaudet’s Board of Directors to grant degrees to deaf students.
Prior to the 1890’s football players could openly discuss play, tactics, and strategies merely by staying far enough out of earshot of the opposing team that they could not be overheard. This changed when Paul Hubbard noticed that opposing deaf teams could ‘eavesdrop’ on his team-talks, by simply reading the sign language he used to communicate with his fellow players. By doing so, opponents were able to read his strategies and set-ups, and thus intercept and counter them.
To resolve this, he organised his team into a tight inward-facing huddled group, where sign language could be openly used, but could not be seen or read by rival deaf teams. The strategy worked, and ‘the huddle’ became a vital part of the Gallaudet Bisons match preparations. Other deaf teams soon adopted a similar strategy, so then ‘the huddle’ became an integral part of the game, and its introduction into the sporting world was conceived.
Celtic History
Huddles have been not uncommon amongst teams across sport, generally used for team talks. At Celtic, John Hogan (1940s) used to initiate a huddle in the changing rooms amongst the players to get them motivated. It did have some somewhat mixed results, as ex-Celtc Tommy Docherty recalled in 2003:
“These days we see players huddled together – bonding they call it – in the middle of the field before the game; well Jimmy Hogan used to have them do that in the dressing room before we went out so it didn’t cause any embarrassment on the pitch.”
It was formally initiated as a tradition at Celtic by former Captain Tony ‘Mogga’ Mowbray (1991 – 1995) who felt it would be a great way of instilling a bit more spirit into the players and cohesiveness into the team. Some say it was partly done as a show of solidarity for Tony Mowbray due to a personal situation but he refutes the suggestion, but there is some truth to it as well.
The inaugural match attributed to the introduction of the Huddle at Celtic was a 2-0 away match to Kickers Emden in Germany. Present in that Huddle were: Bonner, Martin, McKinlay, Mackay, Mowbray, Grant, McLaughlin, Vata, Van Hooijdonk, Walker, Collins. It was history in the making.
The Huddle has since gone on to become an integral part of Celtic’s pre-match ritual, and serves to unite the players, the coaching team and the fans in preparation to face our footballing adversaries. It bonds and readies the First Team and the support against those Celtic are about to commence playing against on the pitch.
One of the most curious Huddles came on 17 Nov 2014. Scotland were playing England at Celtic Park, and incredibly it was England who performed a Celtic Huddle. Some pin the influence of Celtic sympathiser Wayne Rooney in the England side to have got his players to Huddle before the kick-off, but for the Scottish football fans present, it was a curious sight.
In 2010, the Green Brigade started up a mass ‘Huddle’ in the stands as part of their cheer-leading support. Cracking fun and adds to the whole aura of the Huddle. The popularity of it grew rapidly and for the first time in Feb 2001 in a 3-0 win over Rangers, the Green Brigade managed to get practically the whole home support at Celtic Park to join in.
Some claim the mass Huddle in the stands was copied from Man City fans or others (in England they call it the “Poznan“), but who cares, it was at Celtic (through the Green Brigades’ efforts) that it became a stadium-wide (and later international) success and really took the atmosphere at matches to greater heights.
Now, you can’t go anywhere in Celtic circles without fans doing a huddle in pubs, clubs, football terraces, town squares and believe it or not even on top of mountains (on completion of charity walk events). It truly has become an embedded part of the entire Celtic culture.
As Tony Mowbray put it himself wonderfully:
“It’s in the fabric of Celtic now”.
Quotes
“I don’t like to put a patent on it. But I take a great sense of pride in it. It was nothing to do with my wife, as has been wrongly reported. It came out of adversity. The Celtic players needed to show real unity and togetherness. We needed to show the supporters we cared.”
Tony Mowbray (originator of The Huddle at Celtic)
“Every player likes to leave something that people can remember them by and maybe the Huddle is mine at Celtic. I’m delighted to see it’s still going strong, because it’s a brilliant way of uniting the players and the fans. It’s in the fabric of Celtic now.”
Tony Mowbray on the Huddle, (2008)
“It was something that we did when I was a Celtic player, and I always liked it because I thought it set the tone for the game and it also gave the crowd a signal that we were ready to go. It can also help the atmosphere with it being so close to the match starting, so if our fans want to join in by building up the noise and adding to the sense of anticipation I certainly won’t complain, even if it makes it difficult for me to make myself heard.”
Van Dijk on introducing the Huddle to the Liverpool team on being appointed the captain in 2023
3rd July 1995 – The first ever ‘Celtic Huddle’ (modern era)
Inside the Huddle
going clockwise the players are:
Douglas, Balde, Simon Lynch, Agathe, Fernandez, Maloney, Sylla, Guppy, Lennon, Laursen and Lambert.
A Huddle themed Celtic cake!
Articles
and if you know the huddle history
Paul Cuddihy (from Celticfc.net)
THIRTEEN years ago today, on July 23, 1995, a little piece of Celtic history was made when the very first Huddle took place.
It was a pre-season friendly in Germany for Tommy Burns’ Celtic side against Kickers Emden, the game taking place at VfB Jheringsfehn’s ground because of renovation work at Emden’s stadium.
The 3,650 people who were there at what looked more like a public park than a football ground, watched the Hoops go down 2-0, but probably didn’t pay too much attention to the new pre-match ritual.
It was Tony Mowbray, skippering the side in the absence of Paul McStay, who had stayed behind in Scotland to receive treatment for an injury, who came up with the idea of the Huddle as a show of togetherness by the players.
Over the years it has become an integral part of Celtic’s identity, a sign of unity among the men who wear the Hoops as well as a source of inspiration and pride to every Celtic supporter.
And the Huddle is now carried out by Celtic teams of all ages, from the young Bhoys and Ghirls in the Celtic in the Community programmes right through to Gordon Strachan’s first-team.
And while he never imagined that the Huddle would have caught on so spectacularly, Tony Mowbray remains proud of what he started.
Years after that first Huddle on July 23, 1995, he said: “Every player likes to leave something that people can remember them by and maybe the Huddle is mine at Celtic.
“I’m delighted to see it’s still going strong, because it’s a brilliant way of uniting the players and the fans. It’s in the fabric of Celtic now.”
