Match Pictures | Matches: 1973 – 1974 | 1973-1974 Pictures
Trivia
- Sunday football arrived in Scotland!
- This was Celtic’s first ever game played on a Sunday.
- Clydebank had made the proposal for Sunday football during the period of the state of emergency so it was appropriate that the first Sunday game was here.
- A respectable crowd of 28,000 turn up.
- Police say fans behave better during Sunday game and this was also noted in the newspaper reports of the game.
- Celtic draw Stirling Albion in the next round.
Review
Deans is in exceptional form and scored another hat trick and hit the woodwork four times.
Teams
Celtic:
Hunter, McGrain (Davidson), Brogan, McCluskey, McNeill, Hay, Hood, Callaghan, Deans, Dalglish, (Wilson) Lennox
Scorers: Deans 3 (4, 6, 39), Lennox 2 (24, 55), Davidson (64)
Clydebank:
Gallagher, Mitchell, Abel, Fanning, Fallon, White, Roxburgh, Henderson, Larnach, McColl (Law), Currie (McCallan).
Scorer: Fallon (89 pen)
Referee: T R Kyle (Bishobriggs)
Attendance: 28,000
Articles
- Match Report (see end of page below)
Pictures
Articles
How Celtic played their part in Sunday football history – and outcry on what is now taken for granted
https://www.scotsman.com/sport/football/celtic/how-celtic-played-their-part-in-sunday-football-history-and-outcry-on-what-is-now-taken-for-granted-4494269
First-ever Sunday matches in Scotland played 50 years ago this weekend amid protests from ministers
Alan Pattullo
By Alan Pattullo
Published 26th Jan 2024, 13:06 GMT
Updated 26th Jan 2024, 16:01 GMT
Comments
Why is the end of this week of significance to Celtic? Well, Brendan Rodgers turns 51 today, but, sorry Brendan, it isn’t that. Or at least not only that.
The reason one date ought to register on the Parkhead calendar is not so much a birthday as an anniversary. And it’s relevant to not only Celtic, although they – or more strictly Dixie Deans – did create a piece of very special piece of Scottish football history fifty years ago this weekend. At 2.34pm on January 27, 1974, the striker scored Scottish football’s first-ever Sunday goal just four minutes into a Scottish Cup third round tie against Clydebank, who featured someone called Andy Roxburgh up front (whatever happened to him?).
Sunday football clearly suited Celtic. Deans went on to create another entry in the Scottish football history book by scoring the first-ever Sunday hat-trick in his side’s 6-1 win. “He actually gave me a doing that day,” recalls Bankies defender Jim Fallon, now 73, when I called him a couple of days ago. “Unplayable. Well, I found him unplayable. It was an unhappy experience, put it that way.” Fallon did get on the scoresheet in the final minutes from the spot. Although it was only a consolation goal for him and his team, it still riled Celtic who were bidding for a sixth successive clean sheet. “I remember preparing to take the penalty and Billy McNeill was still arguing with the referee that it was never a penalty,” remembers Fallon.
Celtic’s Dixie Deans goes into the record books as he slips the ball past Clydebank keeper Jim Gallacher after only four minutes in the first-ever Sunday match played in Scotland on January 27, 1974. Pic: Daily Record
Celtic’s Dixie Deans goes into the record books as he slips the ball past Clydebank keeper Jim Gallacher after only four minutes in the first-ever Sunday match played in Scotland on January 27, 1974. Pic: Daily Record
It was an afternoon when several clubs stuck their toe in the water by performing on the Sabbath. The Lord’s Day Observance Society was one group not surprisingly angered by this perceived desecration of the day of rest. A minister protested outside Brockville where Falkirk were hosting Dunfermline. “The Rev. Robert McGhee of St Andrew’s Church Falkirk lost his fight against Sunday football,” reported The Scotsman the following day. He began picketing outside the ground at 2pm and handed out leaflets to those going to the game. “He was unable to persuade anyone to turn back from the turnstiles,” the same article noted.
Elsewhere, Aberdeen lost against Dundee in front of over 23,000. In total ten Scottish Cup ties were watched by 92,000 people. It was described as Scottish football supporters voting overwhelmingly in favour of Sunday football although not everyone – including some from within the game – were onside. Hibs managing director Tom Hart urged consideration for the players, “especially the married men, who like to spend that day with their families”.
So what had motivated the experiment, which Jock Stein hailed a huge success? Speaking after a crowd of 28,000 had turned up to see Celtic sweep Clydebank aside, the then Celtic manager said: “We would normally have 12-14,000 for that match on Saturday. It seemed to be a family occasion, with lots of wives and children.”
Rodgers, the current Celtic manager, had celebrated his first birthday the previous day. He was born into uncertain times. Interest rates had shot up and there was, like now, severe tension in the Middle East, which would explode in the form of the Yom Kippur war. The Organisation of Arab Petroleum Exports Countries suspended oil deliveries to western nations who had supported Israel in the conflict with Egypt and Syria. The subsequent energy crisis in the United Kingdom was then exacerbated by industrial action by miners, who refused to do overtime. This halved coal production and had serious repercussions, since most electricity at the time was generated by coal-fired power stations.
Football suffered. How could it be otherwise? Floodlights were no longer permitted to glow for as long, hence why Celtic v Clydebank kicked off at 2.30pm, with Deans striking soon afterwards. The introduction of a three-day week meant Saturday became a working day. Celtic had felt the impact a few weeks earlier when their League Cup final against Dundee was brought forward to 1.30pm from 3pm. That along with the foul weather meant the final was watched by an all-time low crowd of just 28,000 as the favourites fell to a 1-0 defeat.
The decision to allow Sunday football was unanimously agreed at an extraordinary meeting of the Scottish Football Association on 21 January 1974. Condemnation quickly followed. “A slap in the face for the Scottish Church does little to improve the SFA image,” wrote a Reverend Malcolm MacRae in a letter to The Scotsman.
After enjoying their cup win over Aberdeen in front of a bumper gate, Dundee petitioned to play the following weekend’s game against Partick Thistle on the Sunday. Over 7,500 watched them win their first-ever Sabbath league fixture 4-1.
The impetus from England had proven irresistible. Football south of the Border had made the switch to Sunday at the beginning of the month, with the same concerns cited about the impact on church attendance. One letter, printed by the Liverpool Echo, suggested hosting a five-minute service before matches. “I am sure the vast majority of the crowd would respect such a gesture,” wrote a J L Hickers. Everton played their first-ever Sunday game – against West Brom in the FA Cup – on the same day as Scotland made the plunge. Liverpool, by contrast, held out but of course all bowed in the end, including the Anfield side, although their first experience of a ‘Sunday service’ was not until a shock home FA Cup defeat by Brighton in 1983.
Television revenue became the new religion. Sunday games become the norm for top clubs, to the extent that a Liverpool fanzine emerged with the title When Sunday Comes, which was a riff on the already established When Saturday Comes. As for Scotland, it’s routine here now too. Celtic’s last outing – against Buckie Thistle in the Scottish Cup – was on Sunday. Indeed, eyebrows are more likely to be raised if there are no Sabbath fixtures, with this weekend a rare occasion when all six Scottish Premiership fixtures are scheduled to take place on Saturday.
Legendary former Clydebank ‘keeper Jim Gallacher, one of the pioneers that afternoon against Celtic, prefers the almost constant diet of televised Sunday fixtures. It means he had some ex-Bankies teammates, including Fallon, have a game around which to base their weekly apres-Sunday lunch reunions in a Paisley pub. “It’s been good for my social life,” Gallacher, now 72, points out.