1966-03-05: Heart of Midlothian 3-3 Celtic, Scottish Cup

Match Pictures | Matches: 1965 – 1966 | 1965-66 Pictures

Trivia

• Celtic went into the game with only doubts being over Jim Craig. He had been injured in the previous Scottish Cup tie against Aberdeen and was on the road to recovery but not chanced for this game. Celtic fielded an unchanged side from the one that had beaten Dundee 5-0 in the league. Cushley was retained at centre half despite being given a roasting by Wallace in the two teams previous encounter. Hearts had just returned from their play off against Real Zaragossa in the Fairs Cup which they had lost 1-0 to go out. Zaragossa would go on to play Dunfermiline.
• This was an all-ticket game with the maximum crowd set at 45,000. Everyone was urged to get to the ground early despite it being all-ticket.
• FIFA called for the use of substitutes in all games whether for injured players or not. This was another step towards the use of subs.
• On the same day, in the Combined Reserve League, Celtic Reserves were at home to Airdrie Reserves and defeated them 3-0. The scorers were McGowan, J. Quinn and Sweeney. The Celtic team was Fallon, Cunningham, Halpin, Henderson, McCarron, 'Junior', McGowan, Connelly, J. Quinn, Sweeney, Taylor.
• In the other quarter final ties played this day Aberdeen duly overcame Dumbarton 3-0; Dunfermiline pipped a 2-1 win over Kilmarnock with a goal in the last few minutes and Rangers achieved a slim 1-0 over St Johnstone.

Review

The game had to be stopped after two minutes as the crowd spilled onto the field from the Gorgie Rd end. The teams were taken off the field for ten minutes whilst order was restored. Despite the crowd limit and the all-ticket nature it was clear that there were more in the ground than the limit placed pre-match.
When the game finally got going it turned out to be a cracker with Wallace as lively as ever. It was him who opened the scoring for Hearts heading home a Hamilton free kick. Bertie Auld quickly replied to equalise for Celtic with a goal that was flagged as offside by the linesman but allowed by the referee; but back came Hearts to go ahead again when Hamilton turned in a corner. It stood 2-1 to Hearts at half time.
Soon after the inteval McBride, who had injured his wrist and was playing in some discomfort, scored with a cracking shot and then six minutes later another McBride shot saw Chalmers make sure it was across the line despite a desperate attempt at a clearance by Miller. That put Celtic ahead by a nose with half an hour to play. Hearts needed to defend for mush of that time as Celtic – and particularly Johnstone and Hughes finally got going. But with six minutes to go Hearts broke and Wallace fired over a low cross which was dummied to Hamilton who hit a low shot past Simpson to level the score.
Neither side could find a winner in the time that remained and it finished in a very creditable draw to both sides.

Teams

Hearts
Cruickshank, Polland, Shevlane, Higgins, Anderson, Miller, Hamilton, Barry, Wallace, Kerrigan, Traynor
Scorers Wallace (23), Anderson (25), Hamilton (84)

Celtic
Simpson; McNeill, Gemmell; Murdoch, Cushley, Clark; Johnstone, McBride, Chalmers, Auld, Hughes
Scorers Auld (24), McBride (48), Chalmers (54)

Referee: H. Philips (Wishaw)
Attendance: 45,965

Articles

• Match Report (see end of page below)

Pictures

• Match Pictures

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