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Bertie Auld: Lion still roaring
OH what joy on a late summer’s day to be treated to a guided tour by Bertie Auld. Not of Glasgow, not really of his native Maryhill – just the bit we can see from the front step of his old tenement home at 95 Panmure Street, which turns out to be a whole world.
“When folk ask me what my education was I tell them: ‘This, here. This place and its people, all of them right characters.’ I was born through that windae there, son, five of us to the one room. And when my old man died, God rest his soul, we couldn’t help noticing that his occupation on our birth certificates was different each time. Yes, the university of adversity… “
The Lisbon Lion points to an old works entrance – his father had a stint there – which served as a goalmouth for street kickabouts, then across to Partick Thistle’s Firhill: “Ten minutes from the end we’d pick up our tennis ball and rush down for the opening of the gates.” He reels of his neighbours, the Butterleys and the Mucklewees: “Always, if our folks were out, we’d get jam pieces passed through to us.” And being Bertie, he doesn’t just point with his finger but also that famously jutting cartoon chin, one the great Dudley D Watkins himself couldn’t have improved upon.
Auld was at No 95 when I suggested meeting up for a natter, not about Lisbon this time but the Old Firm, who reconvene tomorrow. A charity has spruced up the block for the young homeless and its most famous former occupant was invited to the re-opening. He’s back again today because one trip down memory lane isn’t enough, not when you’re Bertie and you love reminiscing and Celtic fans in far-off Toronto will pay your fare to listen to your tales, as happened recently.
“Over there used to be the pawnbroker’s. I took along a suit once, and a bed-shirt a neighbour had given me. I was glad the place had these cubicles for a wee bit of privacy – like at confession, ha-ha – because I was a player by then. I still got recognised, and when the old boy behind the counter saw the shirt was soiled, I was dead embarrassed. ‘Ten shillings for the jaikit and the breeks,’ he said, ‘and two bob for the shirt and the *****.’
“And see that maroon-coloured shop?” Hand and chin are pointing to the bottom of Panmure Street.
“When Celtic sold me to Birmingham City and I wasn’t going to be around to provide as much, I bought it for my maw for 550 quid.” He’d return to Parkhead, of course: older, wiser, less harem-scarem but still fundamentally a rapscallion, a midfielder brought in from the wing to form a silk-and-steel double-act with Bobby Murdoch – and to do his bit for immortality.
Now we’re at a garage, run by his son Robert. Auld wants the interview to happen here as a “wee boost” for the business. But it’s no panel-beating workshop, rather a Mercedes show room and Robert is the principal dealer. Bertie – nicknamed “Ten-thirty” by Jimmy Johnstone – checks the price of a gull-winged job. “£149,993 – I don’t think I’ve got that on me. Tell you what: the cheque you we were going to give me for this interview – just write it out to my laddie.” We’re not paying for the interview, but I’ve stumped up for alleged comedians who’ve entertained me less. What a card.
And what a snappily-dressed card. Auld is as dapper as you’d expect a celebrity Glaswegian of his vintage to be. He’s 73, with that fine head of hair still intact, and I’m particularly impressed by his patent black pointed loafers – what in Parliamo Glasgow you’d call a “rerr perr” – which twinkle on the tiled showroom floor as he re-tells the story about the pawnbroker, adding that the transaction was to raise the funds for a tank of petrol for his very first motor, a Vauxhall Velux. The salesmen love his patter, that big daft grin, and another yarn about hard times in Maryhill, such as the thrilling day when new neighbours arrived with a ball’s rubber inner. “At last we could blow up our leather outsider and play a proper game.”
So anyway, finally, about bloody time: the Old Firm. Does he remember his debut in the fixture? “Oh aye, I’d been out on loan at Dumbarton when Mr (Jimmy] McGrory called me back: ‘You’re playing at Ibrox on Saturday.’ Me, just 18, recently of Boghead, up against big Corky (George] Young, Scotland captain and icon – what a fantastic baptism. It was the Glasgow Cup but when you belong to this city there are no meaningless Old Firm games. Celtic and Rangers could be playing for a china cup, or it could be just toe-to-toe spitting – the people would come. I seem to remember Bobby Shearer kicking me up in the air and Harold Davis volleying me on the way back down and us losing 1-0.
In his second, glistening spell at Celtic his opponents in the light blue were John Greig, Dave Smith and Kai Johansen – scorer of a stupendous 1966 Scottish Cup-winning goal against Celtic that Auld can still scarcely comprehend – and they were no less uncompromising. “I remember Greigy in the tunnel at Ibrox wanting to know what our win bonus was. ‘Three quid.’ He laughed because they were on six quid.
‘Aye,’ I said, ‘but our three’s guaranteed.’ The bonuses weren’t much, so for 90 minutes my attitude was: ‘That lot are trying to take money from my kids and my maw.’ I’m sure the Rangers guys thought the same.” The bonus for lifting the European Cup in 1967, by the way, was £1500 per man – “but it was taxed so really 900”.
Auld still loves Celtic v Rangers but despaired at the mayhem the fixture generated last season and wonders how the multi-cultural millionaires who engage in it now can possibly enjoy the level of banter generated by Bertie and his home-grown contemporaries. “The humour’s missing from the Old Firm now, I think. When you enjoy something you must express it. One of the ways you can do that is with a grin, and with a chin like mine’s you can’t go wrong! One time, Bobby Shearer had booted me again and I said: ‘Do you know there’s a ball on the park.’ He said: ‘You mean we get one of them as well?’ Willie Henderson was awfie quick-witted. And ‘Tiny’ Wharton the ref always had a quip. ‘You dirty big bandit,’ I told him after we’d lost to Rangers, ‘you never gave us nothing today.’ ‘You’re wrong, Mr Auld. I awarded you a shy in your own half in the last minute.’
Bertie is like a cabaret turn, especially in those shoes. His most famous story, of course, concerns Lisbon, in the tunnel, eyeing up swarthy Inter Milan with their luxurious strips and luminous teeth and shattering their serenity with a blast of “Hail, hail, the Celts are here”. Does he ever get fed up telling it? “No, coming from where I did, I was incredibly lucky to have the life of a footballer. No player should forget this is such a privilege, and what the game means to the ordinary guy.”
There are a couple of times today, though, when he’s almost lost for words. In the first Old Firm game after Lisbon, back at Ibrox, Davie Provan broke his leg in a clash with Auld. It was a bad one. The snapping of bone, so they say, could be heard on the terraces. “Ach, I don’t like talking about that,” he says. “A 50-50 ball, just one of those things, but not great, no.” Weren’t Rangers angry enough with him to threaten to sue? “Yes, but I had the famous Glasgow lawyer Joe Beltrami representing me. The verdict: not Provan.”
In Jock Stein’s legendary team, Auld and Murdoch didn’t split the silk and steel duties; these were one-stop-shop midfielders. YouTube footage reminds us of how Bertie could pick out a pass in the Old Firm pell mell. But he was never self-conscious about playing with “a bit of fire … you needed it; everyone did back then”. It was certainly needed in the 1967 World Club Championship against Argentina’s Racing. “What a bunch of cowards, spitting and stuff behind your back rather than man-to-man. So eventually I decked one of them.” He was sent off but refused to leave the pitch.
Yes, Bertie could, as they say, look after himself.
Is it true he featured in Jackie Charlton’s little black book of unfinished business? “So they tell me!” In the 1970 European Cup semi-final against Charlton’s Leeds at Hampden (attendance: 135,000 “and then some”) Mick Jones warned him at half-time: “The Hunter’s coming to get you.” Bertie: “He meant Norman, of course, but I just acted daft. ‘Who, White Hunter off the telly?'” (The Africa-set jungle adventures dated from 1957, the year of Auld’s Old Firm debut). And then there was Nobby Stiles.
“I don’t like talking about that either,” he says, “but here’s what happened: it was my first game for Hibs and Nobby had been given a free to Middlesboro. It was a friendly but in my book there’s no such thing: the punters have paid to get in and the ball’s there to be won. Nobby clattered me, broke my collar bone. Our trainer Tom McNiven said: ‘You’ll have to come off.’ ‘Give me five minutes,’ I said, and I gave Nobby a wee short ball and, well, he had to be carted off on a stretcher. But he’d have done the same to me.” You might imagine that Auld will always and forever be a Stein disciple and you’d be right, but while Big Jock is rated the best manager he reckons Eddie Turnbull was the best coach.
In many cases, he stresses, foes became friends. “When I was manager of Partick Thistle Davie Provan ran the youth team. We’ve had such rare laughs, the pair of us, and he still phones me once a month.” In his Birmingham days Auld was sent off for slugging two Fulham players, one of them England captain Johnny Haynes, and when the latter came to live in Edinburgh he became a buddy as well. And when he and George Young became hoteliers near each other they used to meet up every Tuesday afternoon for a natter. “Corky was lovely, no evil or badness about him, a gentleman, as were so many of the Rangers guys I played against”.
Perhaps we should close the chapter on Bertie’s dark side – he’s a devoted family man, a grandfather, who met his wife Liz at the dancing at Glasgow’s Locarno and married her at the church next to Birmingham’s St Andrews – and give some more space to his hair, his flair and his hats. You never missed Auld in the 1960s with his jet-black barnet and he scored five against Airdie in Stein’s first game as Celtic manager and a double in the 1965 Scottish Cup win over Dunfermline, which began the trophy haul under Big Jock, also starting Auld’s penchant for fat cigars.
He donned a trilby to celebrate Lisbon and a fedora for the victory over Leeds and while Hibs fans may not remember his time as Easter Road boss as a golden period, they haven’t forgotten the gigantic bunnets. “My favourite was made of cashmere, a present from Celtic fans in the US. And I needed it when we played Manchester United in a friendly when our undersoil heating ensured we were the only show in town. Big Ron Atkinson had a herringbone coat draped to the floor with a fur collar.
I think I matched him with my camelhair, velvet collar – and when Willie Jamieson scored our equaliser I flung the bunnet in the air and it hovered there like Sputnik.”
Entertainment. Hibs chairman Tom Hart – “Another lovely man” – wanted it that day, going to the bother of hiring Man U a private plane. Jock Stein demanded it of his players every game – “The last thing he said as we filed out of the changing-room was: ‘Go and entertain these people.'” And Auld swears by it. “I loved to entertain, just loved it. When Jock said that your chest would swell up all the way down the tunnel and by the time you got on the pitch you thought you were going to burst out of your shirt. Mind you, sometimes I took him too literally.
“Once against Clyde I decided I’d sit on the ball. After the game Jock lifted me off my feet by grabbing me round the throat.” That sounds a bit extreme, I say, and Bertie “Ten-thirty” Auld, emeritus professor of the university of adversity (Maryhill campus), flashes another of those trademark widescreen grins. “Aye well, I actually sat on it three times.”
BERTIE AULD, CELTIC LEGEND AND LISBON LION
By David Potter (from KeepTheFaith website)
David W Potter, Keep The Faith’s resident historian and author, waxes lyrical about the Celtic Legend and Lisbon Lion, Bertie Auld.
David writes:
BERTIE AULD
There is something quintessentially Celtic about Bertie Auld. The gallus Glaswegian boy with a tendency to self-destruct now and again, but with an almost superhuman ability on occasion, Bertie was the Bhoy that the fans would identify with, the one who seemed to sum up everything about Celtic. How good it is that he is mentioned in the Willie Maley Song, “Murdoch, Tully, Johnstone, Auld and Hay”!
He is certainly a Celt through and through.
He could of course have played for Rangers for his religious credentials would have suited, but once he joined Parkhead in 1955, there was no doubt that Celtic was his team. He was a talented left winger. In fact he might have played in the 7-1 game of 1957, for he played in the Quarter Finals and the Semi Final, but the nod was given to Neil Mochan instead. Bertie may have been disappointed, but his great moments were yet to come.
It did not look like that in the next few years, however. Auld played in that dysfunctional forward line which was changed whimsically by Chairman Bob Kelly from week to week. Yet he never really let Celtic down and even had three outings for Scotland, in one of which he was sent off.
For reasons of his poor disciplinary record and his general insubordination to the autocratic regime, Bertie incurred repeatedly the displeasure of Bob Kelly, and thus when Celtic reached the Final of the Scottish Cup in 1961, there was no Bertie Auld. Jock Stein, then Manager of Dunfermline, was delighted with that and it was Celtic’s loss. A matter of days after that disastrous night, Bertie was on his way to Birmingham City for £15,000.
Thus ended a painful time for Bertie, but for Celtic and their fans the agony intensified for the next four years. Meanwhile Bertie played in a Fairs Cities Cup final for Birmingham and won a medal in the League Cup, ironically enough in 1963, the year of Celtic’s greatest catastrophe, the 0-3 defeat in the Scottish Cup Final Replay. Birmingham fans loved him and tolerated his eccentricities. But like Tommy McInally of old, Bertie was pining for home.
Bertie returned to Paradise in mid-January 1965 when Celtic were undergoing another crisis. But what Bertie knew (and the rest of the world didn’t) was that Jock Stein was on his way back. Indeed it was Jock who had been instrumental in bringing him back, possibly even making it a part of the deal with Bob Kelly. Jock then made the crucial decision to play Auld inside and to allow Bobby Lennox to play on the left wing. As you know, when Jock Stein became Celtic manager, it was he and not the Chairman that decided team matters.
The effect of Stein’s positional changes would be electrifying, although not necessarily instantaneous, for some dreadful games were played in spring 1965. But Auld organized the rescue for Celtic in the Scottish Cup Semi Final against Motherwell when the team were 1-0 and then 2-1 down, then in that glorious Final against Dunfermline, he scored both equalizing goals. The first one remains vividly in the memory when a shot from Charlie Gallagher hit the bar and rebounded up in the air and Bertie was there waiting for it. The second was a brilliant one-two with Bobby Lennox, whose telepathic understanding of him was wondrous to behold! And then after McNeill’s Cup Final winner, as we all awaited Deliverance (and expected it to be cruelly snatched away from us), it was Bertie who, before he took a corner kick, insisted in removing police coats to waste time, and it was Bertie who raised both arms to the exultant Celtic End at full time.
An old timer would enthuse about Bertie Auld over the next five years occasionally in a Freudian slip calling him Tommy McInally. The parallels were so striking. The ball control, the visionary passes, the cannonball shot were all in evidence as indeed were the equally desirable characteristics of aggression and determination, now usually well reined in by Jock Stein.
Lisbon was of course the greatest day of all, but it might not have happened but for Bertie Auld. He started the singing of “Sure, it’s a grand old team” in the tunnel to terrify the slick, urbane Italians, and by full time, all Italy knew that it was indeed a grand old team.
Great games were commonplace for Bertie. One could single out the League Cup Final of 1968-9 against Hibs, the one the following year when he scored the only goal against St.Johnstone and the Scottish Cup Final 4-0 defeat of Rangers. But my own favourite was a virtuoso performance against Dundee at Dens Park in January 1971, when he was almost on the way out of Celtic Park. But what a glorious sunset as he inspired Celtic to beat a strong Dundee side, 8-1!
He had been involved in the sad events of Milan in 1970 and must take his share of the blame in the same way that he deserves his share of the credit for beating Leeds United in the European Cup Semi Final. But it was America in summer 1970 that was the catalyst for Bertie’s departure from Celtic Park. He and Tommy Gemmell were sent home by acting Manager Sean Fallon for indiscipline – whether it was for making advances to waitresses, urinating on a bus or getting drunk (believe what you want!), it was another McInally-type facet of his character, as if he couldn’t be good all the time!
But this was a Celtic undergoing reconstruction after the Milan fiasco against Feyenoord, and it was clear in Stein’s rebuilding that there was no long-term room for Bertie Auld, and in 1971 he joined Hibs on a free transfer. He came on as a substitute for Hibs in the Dixie Deans Cup Final of 1972 to a tremendous cheer from the Celtic fans, who still loved him.
He later managed Partick Thistle (twice), Hibs and Dumbarton, but it is with Celtic that he will be forever associated.
He was as good as anyone else in the Lisbon Lions team – and that is some compliment! For the position of left sided midfield in the Greatest Celtic XI of all time, there would be few better. He was quite simply a superb player and a superb Celt.
Bertie is now a flamboyant dresser, usually in green, and a fine after dinner speaker at supporters’ functions.
Bertie Auld certainly qualifies as a Celtic Legend.
SAME AULD Celtic legend Bertie Auld takes swipe at Rangers idol Graeme Souness for saying Light Blues win would be ‘good for Scottish football’
The Lisbon Lion, 79, reckons former Ibrox boss Souey was just jealous of Celtic’s success with his comments
BERTIE AULD claims Graeme Souness was talking nonsense by claiming an Old Firm win for Rangers on Sunday would be good for Scottish football.
The Lisbon Lion, 79, reckons former Ibrox boss Souey was just jealous of Celtic’s success with his comments — and insists his old club will do their talking on the pitch.
Auld said: “Why would a victory for them give our football a boost?
“It’s obvious Souness doesn’t like the fact Celtic are dominating the Scottish game at the moment. His nose is probably out of joint.
“My old club deserve everything that has come their way since Brendan Rodgers took over as manager.
“They have helped raise the standard of the domestic game and we shouldn’t lose sight of that.
“I’m sure other teams have benefited from the professional attitude of Celtic and attempted to match them.
“Now that’s good for our game.
“Rodgers’ team is on the brink of history and they have worked very hard to reach this stage.
“To have gone through an entire season on the home front unbeaten is simply phenomenal.
“No one can say a record like that is a fluke.
“Three trophies in the bag and the club’s first clean sweep since Martin O’Neill achieved the feat in 2001.
“So, we should be applauding the efforts of my old club instead of hoping they are derailed.
“What the club have been doing is something very special and they could be unique at the end of the term if they win back-to-back trebles.
“Souness, of course, is entitled to his opinion, but I don’t think we should be too puzzled as to why he would make those comments.
“Remember, he’s a former Rangers player and manager, so we all know which angle he is coming from.
“For me, I hope the better team win at Ibrox — and I’m convinced it will be Celtic.
“Biased? Yes, you better believe it. Blinded by loyalty to my former club? No chance.
“I look at Celtic and I see better quality players who are also used to these sort of games.
“Rodgers may be without several players who might have started at Ibrox, such as Stuart Armstrong and Leigh Griffiths, two of my favourites.
“They’ll be in the stand on Sunday, but I think Celtic will be able to replace them without breaking stride.
“I reckon Celtic are better with them but even without them they should carry too much firepower for Rangers.
“It was interesting to read that Graeme Murty’s men roared with joy when they heard Sunday’s Scottish Cup semi-final draw that paired them with the holders.
“It’s been so long since they have beaten Celtic they must be working on the law of averages that it will be their turn soon. I wouldn’t bet on it.”
Happy birthday, Bertie!
http://www.celticfc.net/news/17735
By: Paul Cuddihy on 23 Mar, 2020 10:30
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CELTIC legend Bertie Auld is celebrating his 82nd birthday today, and the whole Celtic Family sends its best wishes to the Lisbon Lion.
Bertie made 275 appearances for the Hoops in two different spells with the club, scoring a total of 79 goals. That tally included FIVE in what was Jock Stein’s first game in charge as manager, and a double in the 1965 Scottish Cup final, helping to deliver the first piece of silverware in what was a golden era for the club.
Two years later, he was part of the legendary Celtic side that defeated Inter Milan 2-1 on May 25, 1967 in Lisbon’s Estadio Nacional to lift the European Cup.
Bertie played alongside the late, great Bobby Murdoch in the heart of the Celtic team, and it was the most formidable midfield duo in football at that time.
And today, March 23, as Bertie celebrates his birthday, we bring you a previous interview that the Celtic View had the pleasure of conducting with one of our greatest ever players.
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ONE of the most exciting days of my life and my earliest Celtic memory was the day I first signed for the club.
I had never seen inside Celtic Park and if you can picture it, it was completely empty. It was around 11 o’clock in the morning and I was there with my Dad, Mr Jimmy McGrory and the secretary of my old club, Maryhill Park. There were empty bottles and rubbish lying on the terraces, left over from the game on the Saturday and looking around the stands, I was just trying to imagine what the place would look like full and I just couldn’t. It was the first time that I saw The Jungle, the first time that I had walked down that dark, narrow tunnel out onto the pitch. As a 16-year-old who had been playing Junior football, it was awesome.
SOME people might say that the highlight of my Celtic career was the 1967 season, but I always look back to when I returned here from Birmingham in ‘65.
I had always believed that I would come back and all of a sudden I arrived on a Monday morning, to meet Jimmy McGrory again and also Tommy Riley and Sean Fallon. I flew up that morning with my wife and my daughter and dropped them off in Knightswood at my mother-in-law’s. I then went to Celtic Park, put on one of the old grey training tops, a pair of sandshoes, shorts and socks and went out and loosened up. Jimmy then came out with Sean and Tommy and everything just fell into place. Even just putting on the training gear that day and going out for a run, I felt that I had ‘arrived’. There might have been ups and downs, but from that day on things just seemed to click into place.
THERE were disappointments in my first spell at the club and before I joined Birmingham I had the opportunity to go to Everton in a double transfer with Bobby Collins.
Then, after that, the board tried to transfer me to Blackpool and there was no way I was going to entertain anything like that. I had worked hard to get to Celtic. My Dad had made a lot of great decisions and knew that the time was right for me to join the club as a 16-year-old. He believed I had an opportunity and he was right, it was a fantastic opportunity. Unfortunately, at that time, you didn’t get picked on your ability; it was down to whether or not the chairman, Robert Kelly, liked you. On the day that big Jock and his Dunfermline team beat us in the 1961 Scottish Cup final, I was playing up at Tannadice in a reserve game. That season was a real low for me and when Birmingham came in for me after that game, they got me at the right time. And I couldn’t have picked a better club to go to.
THERE were two or three grounds that I loved to play at, apart from Celtic Park and one was Cathkin, Third Lanark’s ground.
That’s all closed up now, but that was a great place to play, because they always had a team who would try to play football against you and would lift their game. Dens Park in Dundee was another magnificent ground, as was Tynecastle in Edinburgh. Those games always felt like cup finals and there was no love lost in any of the games we played. They were always end to end, with no tackles pulled. Kilmarnock games were a bit like that as well and Rugby Park was another great place to play. But the quality of player during that era of Scottish football was outstanding, there was an abundance of talent. It was an era where people came in their droves to watch the games and it was a fabulous time to play in.
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THERE was one player who never gave me a kick of the ball and I must have played against him round about half a dozen times. Albert Murphy was definitely my toughest opponent.
He was an Irishman who played for Clyde and what a player he was, he was long before his time and was like Danny McGrain – with a bit more height. He was a magnificent player. He went back to Ireland when he finished playing and had so much passion, so much ability and charisma, but was not egotistical. He was certainly the best full back I ever played against.
IT wasn’t until Celtic took us all back to the Estadio National in 2007 for the game against Benfica that I really started to remember the build-up to the European Cup final.
Standing in the tunnel, the memories just started to flood back. I could remember sitting in this big, dark dressing room, with the noise and excitement all around me. The ones who looked the least excited were the ones who were going to play, they all had this calmness about them. Then we walked out into the tunnel, 30 yards up to the steps leading out to the pitch and they then kept us there until everything was ready. I can remember wee Jimmy looking them up and down and talking about the size they were. Now when we were at home, on the bus going to games, we used to sing Celtic songs and that’s what came to me that night. It was second nature and I we just started to sing the ‘Celtic Song’. We started in a quiet, low, deep voice and then, by the final verse, Pavarotti would have been proud of us!
THERE were two great rewards that I have enjoyed from being a part of that Celtic team, the first is the closeness we have and we are such great friends.
The second thing is actually something that my Dad said would happen when I signed in 1955 and he told me that if I did well, then I would become a part of that Celtic support. The people who gathered every week to watch us on the terraces, they were a part of us, as much as we were a part of them. That’s why I have always said that we are ‘a family’. The Celtic supporters were fantastic, they came to us when we were in need and supported us at all times and we will always appreciate that.
Bertie’s Sit Down Strike
jb banalJune 18, 2021Uncategorized
– https://ntvcelticfanzine.com/2021/06/18/berties-sit-down-strike/
Bertie Auld enjoyed a rapport with the fans in the Jungle that very few of his contemporaries could boast of. Indeed, only other characters with the confidence and streetwise streak he possessed, such as Charlie Tully and Jimmy Johnstone, came near to equalling this mutual respect the Jungle and Bertie had for each other.
“They were my kind of people,” Bertie says when discussing his vast army of supporters who packed into the north enclosure. And he was most certainly their hero as they showed on countless occasions during his long love affair with the club.
“The Jungle was the place for me,” says Bertie in a tone that dismisses any attempt at debate. “I was lucky, I suppose, that we were on the same wavelength for that was where the bulk of the real support came from in my days at the park. When those guys got behind you it was a case of knowing you dare not let them down. Many a game they turned for us with their backing and I always set out to get them going. If there was any wee trick I could pull during a game I always tried to do it over there just for their entertainment.
“Mind you, sometimes it got me into bother with big Jock. I remember we were playing Clyde and I had the ball and no one would come near me so i just sat down on it. The punters loved it but the big man nearly blew a gasket. He sent Neilly Mochan round the track to warn me of the dire consequences if I ever did that again. He thought I was taunting the Clyde lads and making a fool of them. There was no way I was doing that. It was just a wee bit of fun and the Clyde players realised that and joined in the laughter. But I should have known better than cross the Big Man, though, as he was very much the boss in those days and nobody ever got on his wrong side if they could help it.
“But that was just my wee gesture to the fans on what was the last appearance of the Lisbon lions before we split up and the fans were there for a bit of entertainment and I decided to give them something different for a change.
“Jock knew how to get the crowds in though. He was a master at pulling strokes. That game was on May 1st 1971 and in the previous game we had played Ayr United and Jock had a fielded a team that was a mixture of the Lions and some of his promising kids who were on the verge of breaking through to the first team. In that game the men from the Lions side were Jim Craig, Billy McNeill, Jimmy Johnstone, Bobby Lennox and Willie Wallace. The others included Kenny Dalglish, Lou Macari, Davie Hay and George Connelly. But for the last game against Clyde the Big Man decided to do it in style and brought back the entire Lison Lions side for the occasion, although Ronnie Simpson just ran out and then, at the kick-off, evan Williams took his place. We won 6:1 with Bobby Lennox getting a hat-trick, Willie Wallace two and Stevie Chalmers the last one.”
Another time when Big Jock pulled a fast one was once more against Clyde when every Celtic player wore the number 8 shorts to demonstrate the club’s eight successive league championship victories. Again Lennox was the scourge of Clyde with another hat-trick in a 5:0 win, with Kenny Dalglish and Danny McGrain getting the other goals.”
Auld, by that time, had left the Parkhead scene to go to Hibs. It had not always been plain sailing for him at Celtic Park and Bob Kelly, who was the chairman at the time, decided to do without Auld and had transferred him to Birmingham City for £15,000 in 1961. But you can’t beat skill and ability, even though it was tinged at times with a fiery temper, and finally Kelly was tempted by Sean Fallon to bring Bertie back into the fold.
In his days with Birmingham, Bertie picked up a winner medal when city bear arch-rivals Aston Villa to win the League Cup. But, as Celtic struggled, they realised how much they needed Auld’s guile and influential midfield skills, and jimmy McGrory signed him again in January 1965 for £12,000.
It was a masterstroke, for within a couple of months Jock Stein arrived to inspire Celtic to a thrilling 3:2 win over Dunfermline in the Scottish Cup final. Bertie played a significant part in that triumph and he was welcomed back where he belonged.
He says, “That was one of the best moves I ever made, although it cost me a fiver of a drop in my basic wage. But it wasn’t a question of whether the money was right for me. the club was right and that was all that mattered. I was back to play for the team I loved and the fans i loved.”
In those earlier days, when he had signed from maryhill harp in 1955, Bertie had made his mark on the senior players around him and these included such as Jock stein, Bobby Evans, Bertie Peacock, Neilly mochan, Bobby Collins and Charlie Tully. Charlie once said that he noted straight away that Auld was not like the other young players who had joined the club around that time. “He was full of confidence in his own ability,” said Charlie, “and he used to lark about in a jockey cap and before I knew what was happening he was calling me ‘daddy’!”
Although Bertie gave his very best at all times, the nights he loved most of all were the big European occasions when his big match temperament came into its own. he milked them to the full and the punters who packed the Jungle still get a warm feeling of contentment when they remember how they saw the home grown talent of the bhoy from maryhill take on the highly paid stars of Europe and emerge triumphant.
From Jungle Tales by John Quinn
Celtic legend, Bertie Auld passes away
https://www.celticfc.com/news/2021/november/14/celtic-legend-bertie-auld-passes-away/
Everyone at Celtic Football Club is devastated to hear of the passing of Lisbon Lion, Bertie Auld, who has died at the age of 83, and the thoughts and prayers of everyone at the club are with Bertie’s family at this extremely sad time.
Bertie was a legend of the club for his many achievements in the green and white Hoops throughout his playing career, and he was adored by the entire Celtic Family for the passion and love that he always showed for Celtic.
In two spells with the club – 1955-61 and then 1965-71 – he made 283 appearances, scoring 85 goals. He won five league titles, four League Cups, three Scottish Cups and, of course, the European Cup in 1967 when he was part of the legendary Celtic side that beat Inter Milan 2-1 on May 25, 1967 in Lisbon’s Estadio Nacional to lift the trophy.
As well as playing his part in that historic day, Bertie also became famous for having led his team-mates in singing ‘The Celtic Song’ in the tunnel that day as they lined up alongside the Inter Milan team.
Celtic chairman, Ian Bankier said: “The most sincere thoughts and prayers of everyone at Celtic are with Bertie’s family at such a difficult time, following this tragic loss.
“I don’t think words can ever adequately describe what Bertie meant to the Club and our supporters. He was a giant of a player, a giant of a man and quite simply Mr. Celtic.
“He scaled the greatest of heights as a player with his talent but it is who he was as a man that made him so much more to us all.
“He enriched all our lives so greatly with his humour, his character and personality and for that we will forever be grateful.
“It was an absolute privilege to have known Bertie and I know just how deeply his passing will be felt by all Celtic supporters. Bertie will forever be regarded as a Celtic great and he will forever be in our hearts.
“We all mourn his passing with great sadness and, of course, we offer our full support to Bertie’s family. May you rest in peace, Bertie.”
Michael Nicholson, acting Chief Executive, said: “To lose Bertie is tragic news and we offer our prayers and support to Bertie’s family at such a difficult time.
“Bertie will always be remembered as one of Celtic’s greatest ever sons, part of a team that delivered the greatest prize of all to the Club and its supporters.
“He brought so much joy to Celtic supporters on and off the field and we thank him and pay tribute to him sincerely for that.
“It was an absolute joy and privilege to be in Bertie’s company, and his brilliant spirit and sense of humour will live long in all our memories.
“He loved the Club so much and, in turn, he was so deeply loved by us all as Celtic supporters.
“Bertie was just unique, there will never be another like him and this really is a very sad day. Our deepest condolences are with Bertie’s family.”
Born on March 23, 1938 in Maryhill, Bertie had just turned 17 when he joined Celtic on April 2, 1955, having caught the eye of scouts while playing for Maryhill Harp.
He would later recall the day he had gone up to Celtic Park to sign for the club, saying: “Both me and my Dad were standing in the middle of the centre circle and he turned round and said to me, ‘Wait ‘til you see this place and wait ‘til you hear this support. If you’re good, they’ll applaud you and if you are fortunate enough to be a success, they’ll never forget you’.”
It’s certainly true to say that the Celtic support did applaud Bertie Auld many times over the next few years, and they have never ever forgotten what he did for the club.
Having joined the club in 1955, Bertie had a loan spell with Dumbarton before returning to the club, and he made his debut in a Charity Cup match against Rangers on May 1, 1957.
It would be just a few months later, however, that the Hoops would record their famous 7-1 victory over Rangers in the League Cup final. Bertie had played in every round of the tournament, but missed out on the final in favour of Neilly Mochan. Bertie, though disappointed to have missed out on that famous victory, always acknowledged that the more experienced Mochan deserved his place in the team.
He remained with the club until 1961 when he left to join Birmingham City, spending four years in England, during which time he won the League Cup with City.
He returned to Paradise in January 1965, just two months before Jock Stein returned to the club as manager, and Bertie would be an integral part of the success Celtic enjoyed over the next few seasons, both domestically and in Europe, forging a midfield partnership with Bobby Murdoch that was unrivalled in world football at that time.
Bertie’s first competitive goal came on August 28, 1957 in a League Cup sectional game against East Fife at Celtic Park, while his last competitive goal in Celtic colours came at Dens Park in a 2-1 victory over Dundee on April 6, 1970.
In Jock Stein’s first game in charge as Celtic manager, Bertie scored five goals in a 6-0 win over Airdrie, while his two most famous goals for the Hoops came in the 1965 Scottish Cup final against Dunfermline Athletic, a game that kick-started the golden era under Jock Stein.
Nicknamed ‘Ten-thirty’ – some Cockney rhyming slang, mixed in with Glaswegian pronunciation! – Bertie Auld was very much a Glasgow boy, born and bred, and proud of his city.
His ‘gallus’ nature was an integral part of his character on and off the field, and as well as being a player of superb quality, he could look after himself – which is probably a diplomatic way of saying that Bertie could be as hard as nails when the occasion arose.
Those qualities, and an incredible determination to win, were harnessed by Jock Stein and used to help drive the team to countless triumphs.
Bertie would later go into football management with Partick Thistle, Hibernian, Hamilton and Dumbarton, but his heart was always at Paradise.
And whether it was at Celtic Park on a matchday, at supporters’ functions in Scotland, Ireland or further afield, going to Celtic FC Foundation events or just meeting fans, Bertie was always at the centre of things, happy to spend time talking about the club and recounting wonderful stories of when he and his team-mates were the Kings of Europe and one of the best teams in the world.
Bertie Auld always loved being a Celt, and the Celtic supporters loved him in return.
Rest in peace, Bertie. You’ll Never Walk Alone.
Bertie Auld, an entertainer on and off the park
https://www.celticfc.com/news/2021/november/14/bertie-auld–an-entertainer-on-and-off-the-park/
By Paul Cuddihy, Celtic View Editor
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The Celtic Family is mourning the loss of Bertie Auld, who has passed away at the age of 83. He was a great player in a great squad, and helped to deliver incredible success for the club, both domestically and in Europe.
He was also a wonderful man, and even amidst the tears and sadness, it is impossible to think of Bertie Auld without also smiling.
For Bertie was a man who was always smiling, delighted to be in the company of Celtic supporters and entertaining everyone with jokes, stories and songs. He had time for everyone he met, and was always appreciative of the support he and his team-mates had received, both during their playing careers and in the years afterwards.
Indeed, reflecting on his time as a Celtic player, Bertie once said: “There were two great rewards that I have enjoyed from being a part of that Celtic team. The first is the closeness we have and we are such great friends.
“The second thing is actually something that my Dad said would happen when I signed in 1955 and he told me that if I did well, then I would become a part of that Celtic support. The people who gathered every week to watch us on the terraces, they were a part of us, as much as we were a part of them.
“That’s why I have always said that we are ‘a family’. The Celtic supporters were fantastic, they came to us when we were in need and supported us at all times and we will always appreciate that.”
Supporters have always been appreciative of what that band of brothers did for Celtic, and that love and gratitude has never wavered.
Bertie was an entertainer when he wore the Hoops – as well as being a player always ready to battle for Celtic – and he played 283 times for the club in two spells, scoring 85 goals and winning 13 major trophies, including the European Cup in 1967.
And he remained an entertainer even after hanging up his boots. It was part of his character, and it was an integral part of the Celtic team he played in, as he once explained: “We never ever had any doubts, within the dressing room, about losing. It was all about playing to our capabilities and to entertain. And that was always Mr Stein’s last words – Always entertain.
“You have the ability, otherwise you wouldn’t be playing at Celtic Park, you wouldn’t be pulling on that jersey, so go and entertain those supporters who’ve paid good money to see you. We had the belief, and the history of Celtic Football Club.”
Every supporter lucky enough to have met Bertie will have their own memories to call upon now, whether that was meeting him outside the stadium on a matchday, or at a supporters’ club function, or perhaps just being fortunate enough to bump into him. He will have made them smile at the time, because it was impossible not to smile in Bertie Auld’s company.
Bertie Auld: Celtic devastated by death of Lisbon Lion as club pay tribute to ‘giant of a man’
Bertie Auld, one of Celtic’s European Cup heroes, has died at the age of 83.
By Matthew Elder
Sunday, 14th November 2021, 6:33 pm
https://www.scotsman.com/sport/football/celtic/bertie-auld-celtic-devastated-by-death-of-lisbon-lion-as-club-pay-tribute-to-giant-of-a-man-3457507
The midfielder scored 85 goals in 283 appearances over two spells for Celtic, the most famous game of which was the 1967 European Cup final win against Inter Milan in Lisbon.
A club statement read: “Everyone at Celtic Football Club is devastated to hear of the passing of Lisbon Lion, Bertie Auld, who has died at the age of 83, and the thoughts and prayers of everyone at the club are with Bertie’s family at this extremely sad time.
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“Bertie was a legend of the club for his many achievements in the green and white Hoops throughout his playing career, and he was adored by the entire Celtic Family for the passion and love that he always showed for Celtic.”
Auld, who won three Scotland caps and was inducted in the Scottish Football Hall of Fame, also played for Birmingham and ended his playing career at Hibernian.
As well as the Hoops’ Lisbon triumph, he won six league championship medals, four Scottish Cups and five League Cups.
After hanging up his boots, Auld went on to manage Hibs, Partick Thistle – whose Firhill ground was just a goal-kick away from Panmure Street in Glasgow where he was born – Hamilton and Dumbarton.
However, Celtic remained his first love and he spent his later years regaling the Hoops faithful with stories in the club’s hospitality suites.
The club announced in June that Auld was suffering from dementia.
Celtic chairman Ian Bankier said: “The most sincere thoughts and prayers of everyone at Celtic are with Bertie’s family at such a difficult time following this tragic loss.
“I don’t think words can ever adequately describe what Bertie meant to the club and our supporters. He was a giant of a player, a giant of a man and quite simply Mr Celtic.
“He scaled the greatest of heights as a player with his talent, but it is who he was as a man that made him so much more to us all.
“He enriched all our lives so greatly with his humour, his character and personality and for that we will forever be grateful.
“It was an absolute privilege to have known Bertie and I know just how deeply his passing will be felt by all Celtic supporters. Bertie will forever be regarded as a Celtic great and he will forever be in our hearts.
“We all mourn his passing with great sadness and, of course, we offer our full support to Bertie’s family. May you rest in peace, Bertie.”
Michael Nicholson, Celtic’s acting chief executive, said: “Bertie will always be remembered as one of Celtic’s greatest ever sons, part of a team that delivered the greatest prize of all to the club and its supporters.
“He brought so much joy to Celtic supporters on and off the field and we thank him and pay tribute to him sincerely for that.
“It was an absolute joy and privilege to be in Bertie’s company and his brilliant spirit and sense of humour will live long in all our memories.
“He loved the club so much and, in turn, he was so deeply loved by us all as Celtic supporters.
“Bertie was just unique, there will never be another like him and this really is a very sad day. Our deepest condolences are with Bertie’s family.”
Describing Auld as a “brilliant man with a huge personality”, Hibs said they were “saddened” by the death of their former player and manager, adding: “Everyone at Hibernian Football Club sends their condolences to Bertie’s family and loved ones at this time.”
Bertie Auld: Celtic’s Lisbon Lion dies aged 83
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/59284380?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=KARANGA
2 hours ago2 hours ago.From the section Scottish
Bertie Auld
Bertie Auld helped Celtic become the first British side to lift the European Cup
Bertie Auld, who played in the Celtic side that lifted the European Cup in 1967, has died at the age of 83.
Five months ago, it was announced he was suffering with dementia.
Best known for being one of Celtic’s Lisbon Lions, Auld also won five league titles, three Scottish Cups and four League Cups at Parkhead.
The former midfielder spent four years with Birmingham City between two spells with the Glasgow club before finishing his playing days with Hibernian.
Capped three times for Scotland, he went on to twice manage Partick Thistle as well as Hibs, Hamilton Academical and Dumbarton.
“I don’t think words can ever adequately describe what Bertie meant to the club and our supporters. He was a giant of a player, a giant of a man and quite simply Mr Celtic,” said Parkhead chairman Ian Bankier
.
“He scaled the greatest of heights as a player with his talent but it is who he was as a man that made him so much more to us all.
“He enriched all our lives so greatly with his humour, his character and personality and for that we will forever be grateful.”
Bertie Auld visits his old home in Panmure Street and shares memories of his childhood
As a player, he made 279 appearances for Celtic and was part of Jock Stein’s side that made history as the first from Britain to win the European Cup with a 2-1 victory over Inter Milan before also losing the 1970 final to Feyenoord.
Auld made more than 100 league appearances with Birmingham, also helping the club reach the 1960-61 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, where they lost to 4-2 to Roma.
As a manager, he twice won Scotland’s second tier – with Thistle in 1976 and Hibs in 1981.
Lisbon Lion and Celtic legend Bertie Auld dies at the age of 83
https://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/lisbon-lion-and-celtic-legend-bertie-auld-dies-at-the-age-of-83-41051422.html
November 14 2021 07:56 PM
The only thing sharper than Bertie Auld’s tackling was his wit.
The former Celtic midfielder – who has died aged 83 – was the man who provided the steel to Jock Stein’s band of swashbuckling Scots as the Lisbon Lions conquered Europe.
But Bertie, or Ten-Thirty as he was known to his team-mates, was not some brooding thug, snarling sinister threats as he put the boot in.
It was with his tongue that Auld would cause the most damage as he left his opponents stuttering in search of a retort.
Few escaped a verbal lashing from this master of the one-liner. During an Old Firm clash, Rangers captain John Greig defender asked Auld what bonus the Celtic team could expect for a win. When the Hoops player said £5 a man, Greig replied: “We’re on £10”. But that only left the door open for Auld to hit back: “Aye, but ours is guaranteed.”
His taunts were usually quickly soothed by a flash of his trademark toothy grin to show no hard feelings were meant.
Born in March 1938, he was the eldest son of eight children born to his father Joe, a crane driver, and mother Margaret, who would attempt to make ends meet by selling fish and fruit from the back of a horse-led cart.
Times were tight and he would often have to share a bed with his siblings in their tiny two-bedroomed home in Panmure Street – just a goal-kick away from Partick Thistle’s Firhill ground in the Maryhill district of Glasgow.
That continued even after he signed for Celtic in 1955 following a spell with junior outfit Maryhill Harp.
In his autobiography, Auld remembers his mother giving him a “treat” after being handed his first full-time contract by then Parkhead boss Jimmy McGrory – he was allowed to choose which side of the bed he would sleep on.
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“Well, one of my brothers had a wee bit of a problem holding his water sometimes,” he recalled. “So I immediately said, ‘I’ll take the shallow end!’”
Auld – whose ability to dish out meaty tackles was also matched by his ability to thread a pass and find the net – had two stints at Celtic Park but the first six-year spell coincided with a barren period for the Hoops.
A number of run-ins with Bob Kelly – the then all-powerful Celtic chairman who even on occasion had the final say on team selections – saw him sold to Birmingham for £15,000 in 1961.
It took time to settle in the Midlands and he is best remembered at St Andrew’s for decking England star Johnny Haynes during a confrontation with Fulham.
But Auld – who married his wife Liz during his time with the Blues – pined for a return to his first love, Celtic.
That opportunity came as Kelly’s grip on the club loosened after Jock Stein was appointed manager in 1965.
Within weeks the Hoops’ eight-year trophy drought had ended as the Scottish Cup was claimed. That triumph would spark an era of domestic domination that stretched to nine straight title wins.
Auld was officially signed by interim boss Sean Fallon in January 1965 but it was on Stein’s orders as he served out his notice period with Hibernian before officially taking over at Parkhead.
If Auld’s first period with Celtic had coincided with a grim, trophyless spell, his second was positively glorious as Stein’s team swept all aside, climaxing in victory over Inter Milan in the 1967 European Cup final.
Auld famously left the Italians looking on bewildered as he burst into the Celtic Song in the tunnel before kick-off – and Celtic certainly went on to hit all the right notes in Lisbon.
He almost grabbed a bigger share of the limelight himself as he cracked the crossbar with a long-range strike but the 2-1 win ensured all of Stein’s men would have their names written into Celtic folklore.
Inter, under Helenio Herrera, had mastered the art of defending with their Catenaccio tactics but Auld later declared: “We demolished the notion you could only be triumphant if you concentrated mainly on defence. It was a victory for the good guys.”
There were regrets, however, such as his side’s failure to turn European glory into global domination as they lost out to Racing Club of Argentina in the Intercontinental Cup play-off.
The rough-house tactics of the South Americans finally broke the Scots’ cool in the third-match decider in Montevideo, Uruguay. Celtic had four players sent off but the Paraguayan referee’s lack of control during an ugly, bad-tempered clash was summed up when Auld was allowed to stay on the pitch as he refused to walk after being ordered off himself.
And defeat to Feyenoord in Milan denied Auld and his colleagues a second European Cup winners’ medal.
After 279 appearances and 85 goals, he left Celtic in 1971 having claimed six league titles, four Scottish Cups and five League Cups – plus his life-long membership of the Lisbon Lions.
Despite playing such a vital part in the Parkhead outfit’s historic achievements, Auld was only rewarded with three international caps, all in a seven-month period during 1959. Perhaps the fact he became the first Scotland player to be sent off when he lashed out in retaliation at a Dutch opponent on his debut contributed to his meagre appearance tally.
Before hanging up his boots he had spells at Hibernian and later managed the Easter Road side. He also twice returned to his native Maryhill to manage Thistle and had stints in charge of Hamilton and Dumbarton.
But his closest ties were to Celtic and in the years that followed he could be found on the club’s TV channels or holding court with fans in the Parkhead hospitality suites, reciting his never-ending repertoire of stories – and delivered always with a typically killer punchline.
Auld is survived by his wife Liz, daughter Susan and son Robert.
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18:1514 Nov 2021
SOCCERAuld
Celtic great and Lisbon Lion Bertie Auld dies aged 83
Bertie Auld, one of Celtic’s European Cup heroes, has died
Celtic legend Bertie Auld dies aged 83 as club pay tribute to Lisbon Lion
https://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/19716373.celtic-legend-bertie-auld-dies-aged-83-club-pay-tribute-lisbon-lion/
By Aidan Smith @SmithAidan1 Digital Sport Audience & Engagement Editor
Celtic legend Bertie Auld dies aged 83 as club pay tribute to Lisbon Lion
Celtic legend Bertie Auld dies aged 83 as club pay tribute to Lisbon Lion
28 comments
CELTIC have confirmed that club legend Bertie Auld has sadly passed away.
The Scotland international spent 12 years with the Hoops across two spells and famously was part of Jock Stein’s team who produced a heroic run to the European Cup in 1967.
A Celtic statement read: “Everyone at Celtic Football Club is devastated to hear of the passing of Lisbon Lion, Bertie Auld, who has died at the age of 83, and the thoughts and prayers of everyone at the club are with Bertie’s family at this extremely sad time.
“Bertie was a legend of the club for his many achievements in the green and white Hoops throughout his playing career, and he was adored by the entire Celtic Family for the passion and love that he always showed for Celtic.
“In two spells with the club – 1955-61 and then 1965-71 – he made 283 appearances, scoring 85 goals. He won five league titles, four League Cups, three Scottish Cups and, of course, the European Cup in 1967 when he was part of the legendary Celtic side that beat Inter Milan 2-1 on May 25, 1967 in Lisbon’s Estadio Nacional to lift the trophy.
“As well as playing his part in that historic day, Bertie also became famous for having led his team-mates in singing ‘The Celtic Song’ in the tunnel that day as they lined up alongside the Inter Milan team.
“Bertie Auld always loved being a Celt, and the Celtic supporters loved him in return. Rest in peace, Bertie. You’ll Never Walk Alone.”
Auld, who won three Scotland caps, also played for Birmingham and ended his playing career at Hibernian.
As well as the Hoops’ Lisbon triumph, he won six league championship medals, four Scottish Cups and five League Cups.
After hanging up his boots, Auld went on to manage Hibs, Partick Thistle – whose Firhill ground was just a goal-kick away from Panmure Street in Glasgow where he was born – Hamilton and Dumbarton.
However, Celtic remained his first love and he spent his later years regaling the Hoops faithful with stories in the club’s hospitality suites.
The club announced in June that Auld was suffering from dementia.
Celtic chairman Ian Bankier said: “The most sincere thoughts and prayers of everyone at Celtic are with Bertie’s family at such a difficult time following this tragic loss.
“I don’t think words can ever adequately describe what Bertie meant to the club and our supporters. He was a giant of a player, a giant of a man and quite simply Mr Celtic.
“He scaled the greatest of heights as a player with his talent, but it is who he was as a man that made him so much more to us all.
“He enriched all our lives so greatly with his humour, his character and personality and for that we will forever be grateful.
“It was an absolute privilege to have known Bertie and I know just how deeply his passing will be felt by all Celtic supporters. Bertie will forever be regarded as a Celtic great and he will forever be in our hearts.
“We all mourn his passing with great sadness and, of course, we offer our full support to Bertie’s family. May you rest in peace, Bertie.”
Michael Nicholson, Celtic’s acting chief executive, said: “Bertie will always be remembered as one of Celtic’s greatest ever sons, part of a team that delivered the greatest prize of all to the club and its supporters.
“He brought so much joy to Celtic supporters on and off the field and we thank him and pay tribute to him sincerely for that.
“It was an absolute joy and privilege to be in Bertie’s company and his brilliant spirit and sense of humour will live long in all our memories.
“He loved the club so much and, in turn, he was so deeply loved by us all as Celtic supporters.
“Bertie was just unique, there will never be another like him and this really is a very sad day. Our deepest condolences are with Bertie’s family.”
Bertie Auld, former Hibs manager and player, dies at age of 83
Phil Johnson
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/sport/american-football/bertie-auld-former-hibs-manager-and-player-dies-at-age-of-83/ar-AAQHgzt
1 hour ago
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He was suffering with dementia.
© Bertie Auld arrives at Easter Road in 1980 to take the managerial reins at his former club. He won t…
Best known for being one of Celtic’s Lisbon Lions, Auld also won five league titles, three Scottish Cups and four League Cups for the Parkhead club.
The former midfielder spent four years with Birmingham City between two spells with the Glasgow club before finishing his playing days with Hibs from 1971 to 73.
Auld finished his playing career at Hibs where he combined duties on the pitch with a trainer role off it, scoring three goals in 16 appearances before focusing solely on his off-field position.
Capped three times for Scotland, he went to manage Partick Thistle for six years before returning to Easter Road as managers, replacing Willie Ormond in 1980. He guided Hibs to the First Division title and promotion back to the top flight in 1980-81 before being replaced by Pat Stanton in 1982.
© Bertie Auld, pictured as Hibs manager. He was in charge of the Easter Road club from 1980 to 1982
Auld led the Capital club to 24 wins in 39 games, conceding just 24 goals along the way, to ensure a swift return to the top flight.
Chairman Tom Hart had promised the squad a tour of America and the Caribbean if they won promotion but a one-off game in Nigeria in April 1981 was called off by the manager.
Auld led Hibs to sixth on their return to the top flight but was replaced by former Easter Road team-mate and fellow ex-Celtic player Pat Stanton before the start of the 1982/83 season.
He went on to have a short stint as manager at Hamilton Accies before returning to Maryhill in 1986 for another spell as Jags boss, with his final management role coming in 1988 when he took charge of Dumbarton in January 1988.
Auld is one of just six managers to win a league title while at Hibs, joining Dan McMichael – de facto manager when the Easter Road side won the Scottish Cup and league in 1902 and 1903 respectively – Hugh Shaw, Bobby Templeton, Alex McLeish, and Neil Lennon, with the latter three winning second-tier titles.
© Hibs’ Bertie Auld challenges for the ball with Jim Brogan in the 1972 Scottish Cup final, which Celt…
Celtic chairman Ian Bankier said: “He scaled the greatest of heights as a player with his talent but it is who he was as a man that made him so much more to us all.
© Bertie Auld and the Hibs team pose with the First Division trophy at Easter Road
“He enriched all our lives so greatly with his humour, his character and personality and for that we will forever be grateful.”
As a player, he made 279 appearances for Celtic and was part of Jock Stein’s side that made history as the first from Britain to win the European Cup with a 2-1 victory over Inter Milan before also losing the 1970 final to Feyenoord.
Auld was inducted into the Scottish Football Hall of Fame in 2009 as his legendary career was recognised by the SFA.
Following his retirement from the game, Auld was a regular figure around Celtic Park regularly appearing at games and club events.
A club statement read: “Bertie was a legend of the club for his many achievements in the green and white Hoops throughout his playing career, and he was adored by the entire Celtic Family for the passion and love that he always showed for Celtic.”
Obituary: Tribute to Celtic legend and Lisbon Lion Bertie Auld
‘Wherever there was a Celtic party, the wee man was never far away’.
Legend: Lisbon Lion Bertie Auld has passed away at the age of 83. Craig Williamson via SNS Group
Legend: Lisbon Lion Bertie Auld has passed away at the age of 83.
By Bernard Ponsonby
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Celtic legend and Lisbon Lion Bertie Auld has died at the age of 83
Celtic legend Bertie Auld diagnosed with dementia
If Billy McNeill is the never to be forgotten icon of Lisbon 1967, Jimmy Johnstone the irrepressible entertainer, Bobby Murdoch the beating heart of this country’s greatest ever club side, then Bertie Auld is the enduring spirit.
As everyone who walks Kerrydale Street or has attended a supporter’s function or drank in a Celtic pub will know, there was no greater ambassador for remembering the magic of that night or of honouring the memory of his departed brothers than Bertie Auld.
It was Auld who led the singing of the Celtic song as the players emerged from the tunnel in the Estadio Nacional, no doubt to the bemusement of the sculpted, tanned athletes of Inter Milan.
Although his own legendary status was assured as a result of the events of May 25, 1967, to the day he died he redefined the notion of a diehard. Wherever there was a Celtic party, the wee man was never far away.
ADVERT
Robert Auld was born on March 23, 1938 in the Maryhill district of Glasgow. He had boyhood affection for local side Partick Thistle but he ended up in his first spell at Celtic when he was signed in 1955 from Maryhill Harp.
Auld’s talent was never really in doubt. He read the game superbly and had great vision and touch.
What he did not have was an even temperament and he often seemed to think that the slightest mis-timed tackle or an engagement from another player that replicated his own style should be met with what is known in these parts as a square go.
A fiery temperament allied to a seemingly natural contempt for authority sealed his fate and he was transferred in 1961 to Birmingham City. His hard man status was confirmed with further brushes with authority in the Midlands.
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Celtic Park: Auld laying a wreath in tribute to Billy McNeill in 2019.
ADVERT
The arrival of Jock Stein at Celtic Park in March of 1965 paved the way for his return although Sean Fallon appears to have played a hand in this not least in soothing the concerns of the club chairman Bob Kelly who did not like an overly physical presence that could be seen as a contempt for the notion of fair play.
The rewards for Celtic were almost immediate. He scored five goals in a 6-0 drubbing of Airdrie.
By common consent the 1965 Scottish Cup final was more than just Celtic’s first trophy in eight years. It was the foundation for the eventual scaling of football’s Everest.
The 3-2 defeat of a highly talented Dunfermline Athletic unleashed a trophy bounty which lasted for years. The grainy TV footage recalls McNeill’s towering header that delivered the cup but in many ways the day belonged above all else to Auld who scored twice after Dunfermline had twice gone ahead.
In season 1966-67 Celtic won everything they entered and Auld’s midfield partnership with Bobby Murdoch provided a winning mix of grit, physical presence, accurate passing and a superb reading of the game.
That Lisbon team contained a mix of characters from the gentlemanly goalkeeper Ronnie Simpson, the garrulous Johnstone, the studious Jim Craig, the world-class Tommy Gemmell and Bobby Murdoch to the more retiring figures of John Clark, Bobby Lennox, Stevie Chalmers and Willie Wallace. Their leader was the tribune figure of Billy McNeill.
Auld provided a working man’s club full of humour by the day. His comic persona was disproportionate to his small frame. He was a giant in the fun stakes, quick, sharp, frequently hilarious and utterly at home with those supporters who were always utterly at home with him.
His misbehaviour did not necessarily mellow in his second spell and not even the towering presence of Stein could curb it, assuming he wanted to.
Another tie of note was the 1970 European Cup semi-final against Leeds United, which Celtic won by 3-1 on aggregate with Auld and Murdoch again dictating the tempo in the 2-1 victory at Hampden Park in front of the biggest crowd for a European club match.
Celtic lost the 1970 European Cup final to Feyenoord. The ennui that set in signalled the end of the Lions who had one final swan song in a 6-1 victory over Clyde on May 1, 1971.
It was Auld’s final game but merely marked the end of his playing career. The affair of the heart had many years to run.
There is probably a consensus among the players of that time that Stein dismantled the Lisbon side too quickly. But he was perhaps encouraged to do so by the emergence of his Quality Street kids.
In all Auld won five League Championship medals, four League Cup and three Scottish Cup medals along with his football Oscar won in Lisbon.
After Celtic he played briefly for Hibs, whom he also managed for two seasons, winning promotion back to the top flight for the Edinburgh club.
He had spells at Hamilton and Dumbarton and twice managed Partick Thistle of which the period between 1974-1980 represented his longest tenure in club management.
Auld is a throwback to the age when players grew up as supporters and lived alongside other fanatics in an impressive egalitarianism. It was an age when heroes were not cocooned or aloof or unapproachable.
He never needed to kiss a badge, pump the air with his fist or utter pre-rehearsed sentiments about love of club. He knew he was the real deal and so did those who follow Celtic.
Making time for those whose emotional investment was total was never too much trouble, for he recognised a kindred spirit.
If he was ever at STV and you bumped into him he never, ever passed you by. Your company was his cue for more excited chat about a life’s passion.
He was always direct with his opinions, and like the way he tackled on the park, never shirked from an argument.
As you might be able to tell from this somewhat gushing tribute, I reserve an extra wide smile for Bertie, a man who made me laugh but impressed me as quite simply one of the best Celtic supporters I have ever met.
Obituary: Bertie Auld, quick-witted Lisbon Lion who helped Celtic conquer Europe
The Scotsman
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Bertie Auld, football player and manager. Born: 23 March, 1938 in Glasgow. Died: 14 November, 2021 aged 83
© Bertie Auld wrote himself into Scottish football folklore as a member of the Lisbon Lions
The only thing sharper than Bertie Auld’s tackling was his wit.
The former Celtic midfielder – who has died aged 83 – was the man who provided the steel to Jock Stein’s band of swashbuckling Scots as the Lisbon Lions conquered Europe.
But Bertie, or Ten-Thirty as he was known to his teammates, was not some brooding thug, snarling sinister threats as he put the boot in.
It was with his tongue that Auld would cause the most damage as he left his opponents stuttering in search of a retort.
Few escaped a verbal lashing from this master of the one-liner. During an Old Firm clash, Rangers captain John Greig defender asked Auld what bonus the Celtic team could expect for a win. When the Hoops player said £5 a man, Greig replied: “We’re on £10”. But that only left the door open for Auld to hit back: “Aye, but ours is guaranteed.”
His taunts were usually quickly soothed by a flash of his trademark toothy grin to show no hard feelings were meant.
Born in March 1938, he was the eldest son of eight children born to his father Joe, a crane driver, and mother Margaret, who would attempt to make ends meet by selling fish and fruit from the back of a horse-led cart.
Times were tight and he would often have to share a bed with his siblings in their tiny two-bedroomed home in Panmure Street – just a goal-kick away from Partick Thistle’s Firhill ground in the Maryhill district of Glasgow.
That continued even after he signed for Celtic in 1955 following a spell with junior outfit Maryhill Harp.
In his autobiography, Auld remembers his mother giving him a “treat” after being handed his first full-time contract by then Parkhead boss Jimmy McGrory – he was allowed to choose which side of the bed he would sleep on.
“Well, one of my brothers had a wee bit of a problem holding his water sometimes,” he recalled. “So I immediately said, ‘I’ll take the shallow end!'”
Auld – whose ability to dish out meaty tackles was also matched by his ability to thread a pass and find the net – had two stints at Celtic Park but the first six-year spell coincided with a barren period for the Hoops.
A number of run-ins with Bob Kelly – the then all-powerful Celtic chairman who even on occasion had the final say on team selections – saw him sold to Birmingham for £15,000 in 1961.
READ MORE: Obituaries: Walter Smith OBE, Rangers manager who led club during a golden era
It took time to settle in the Midlands and he is best remembered at St Andrew’s for decking England star Johnny Haynes during a confrontation with Fulham.
But Auld – who married his wife Liz during his time with the Blues – pined for a return to his first love, Celtic.
That opportunity came as Kelly’s grip on the club loosened after Jock Stein was appointed manager in 1965.
Within weeks the Hoops’ eight-year trophy drought had ended as the Scottish Cup was claimed. That triumph would spark an era of domestic domination that stretched to nine straight title wins.
Auld was officially signed by interim boss Sean Fallon in January 1965 but it was on Stein’s orders as he served out his notice period with Hibernian before officially taking over at Parkhead.
If Auld’s first period with Celtic had coincided with a grim, trophyless spell, his second was positively glorious as Stein’s team swept all aside, climaxing in victory over Inter Milan in the 1967 European Cup final.
Auld famously left the Italians looking on bewildered as he burst into the Celtic Song in the tunnel before kick-off – and Celtic certainly went on to hit all the right notes in Lisbon.
He almost grabbed a bigger share of the limelight himself as he cracked the crossbar with a long-range strike but the 2-1 win ensured all of Stein’s men would have their names written into Celtic folklore.
Inter, under Helenio Herrera, had mastered the art of defending with their catenaccio tactics but Auld later declared: “We demolished the notion you could only be triumphant if you concentrated mainly on defence. It was a victory for the good guys.”
There were regrets, however, such as his side’s failure to turn European glory into global domination as they lost out to Racing Club of Argentina in the Intercontinental Cup play-off.
The roughhouse tactics of the South Americans finally broke the Scots’ cool in the third-match decider in Montevideo, Uruguay. Celtic had four players sent off but the Paraguayan referee’s lack of control during an ugly, bad-tempered clash was summed up when Auld was allowed to stay on the pitch as he refused to walk after being ordered off himself.
And defeat to Feyenoord in Milan denied Auld and his colleagues a second European Cup winners’ medal.
READ MORE: Obituary: William ‘Billy’ McNeill, Celtic footballing legend, leader of the Lisbon Lions, Scottish internationalist
After 279 appearances and 85 goals, he left Celtic in 1971 having claimed six league titles, four Scottish Cups and five League Cups – plus his life-long membership of the Lisbon Lions.
Despite playing such a vital part in the Parkhead outfit’s historic achievements, Auld was only rewarded with three international caps, all in a seven-month period during 1959. Perhaps the fact he became the first Scotland player to be sent off when he lashed out in retaliation at a Dutch opponent on his debut contributed to his meagre appearance tally.
Before hanging up his boots he had spells at Hibernian and later managed the Easter Road side. He also twice returned to his native Maryhill to manage Thistle and had stints in charge of Hamilton and Dumbarton.
But his closest ties were to Celtic and in the years that followed he could be found on the club’s TV channels or holding court with fans in the Parkhead hospitality suites, reciting his never-ending repertoire of stories – and delivered always with a typically killer punchline.
Auld is survived by his wife Liz, daughter Susan and son Robert.
OBITUARY: Battling Bertie Auld was more than just the joker in Jock Stein’s pack at Celtic
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November 15, 2021 65
https://www.nytimespost.com/obituary-battling-bertie-auld-was-more-than-just-the-joker-in-jock-steins-pack-at-celtic/
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He was wider than the river which runs through the city of his birth. As a footballer, he was lionised for his contribution to all that came before and after Lisbon.
As a singer, his modest vocal gifts were never any barrier to an impromptu rendition or five wherever his extraordinary life took him.
Bertie Auld’s death at the age of 83 on Sunday will be felt across the world by that generation of Celtic fans who watched him conquer Europe in 1967 and also by those who simply felt his personality radiate from the terraces when he reverted to being one of them again.
Bertie Auld’s death will be felt by the Celtic fans who watched him conquer Europe in 1967
Bertie Auld’s death will be felt by the Celtic fans who watched him conquer Europe in 1967
Auld was a supremely talented footballer and had a liking for the dark arts of the game
Auld was a supremely talented footballer and had a liking for the dark arts of the game
Auld (pictured with Rod Stewart) was blessed with razor-sharp wit and he had an appetite for a practical joke
Auld (pictured with Rod Stewart) was blessed with razor-sharp wit and he had an appetite for a practical joke
While he would never have claimed to have been the finest player in Jock Stein’s peerless side, he was a supremely talented footballer in his own right – his liking for the dark arts of the game no state secret either.
‘He could kill the ball immediately and know exactly where it was to be launched with radar accuracy,’ the late Tommy Gemmell once recalled.
‘He had an instinctive feel for the game. Bertie wouldn’t have to look round when he was hitting the ball wide for me to run on to. He just knew I’d be there.
‘He was frightened of nothing and no one. He was a marvellous team man too – a guy who could get you out of a tight spot.
‘The bigger the occasion, the more he revelled in the atmosphere. It was like oxygen to him.’ Born at 95 Panmure Street, Maryhill in 1938, the first in a family of eight, Auld played for Maryhill Harp, joining Celtic in 1955 where he was converted from a full-back to a winger.
With Celtic going through a prolonged fallow period, he spent a season on loan at Dumbarton but was unable to rid himself of an impetuous streak and was sold to Birmingham City for £15,000 in 1961.
A marvellous team player, Celtic star Auld wasn’t frightened of anything or anybody
A marvellous team player, Celtic star Auld wasn’t frightened of anything or anybody
Tenacious, fast and blessed with vision and a deft touch, the Blues were to be the beneficiaries of that particular transaction. By then a centre midfielder, Auld won the League Cup with City in 1963 having made his debut in the final of the 1961 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup which they lost to Roma.
He returned to Celtic in January 1965 in a £12,000 deal shortly before Stein came back to the club from Hibernian.
Given the offer to return was made by a close confidante of Stein’s called Dougie Hepburn, Auld had a strong inclination that the Big Man was behind the move and was about to replace Jimmy McGrory as manager.
‘Big Jock had plenty to contend with as he attempted to awaken the club from its slumbers,’ Auld recalled of a move that necessitated a pay cut. ‘I was ready to do my bit.’ The following April, victory over Dunfermline in the Scottish Cup Final kicked-off Celtic’s golden era.
But no one then could have guessed that the midfield partnership Auld had formed with Bobby Murdoch would become the bedrock of the side which would beat Inter Milan 2-1 two years later in the Portuguese capital.
He would be present for five of the titles which comprised the club’s first nine-in-a row, would claim three Scottish Cups and four League Cups and also played in the ill-fated European Cup Final against Feyenoord in 1970.
His display at Hampden in the semi-final that year against Leeds was seen as his best in the hoops.
He didn’t score in Lisbon three years previously but his contribution to that historic success became every bit as famous as that of Gemmell or Stevie Chalmers.
Standing in the tunnel beside Inter’s immaculately groomed players – ‘They all looked like film stars’ – Auld began singing The Celtic Song, with the words soon emanating from team-mates.
Helenio Herrera’s players laughed it off at the time but later admitted to being startled.
‘It was highly unusual, of course, and it certainly got the message across that this wee team from Glasgow were not just there to make up the numbers,’ Auld said.
His relationship with Stein was at times fiesty. The manager once pinned Auld to the dressing room wall by his throat after a win over Clyde, retribution for the fact the midfielder had sat on the ball three times.. And it was not the only time they clashed.
‘Once Jock went up like Vesuvius, it took a long time for him to come back to earth,’ Auld recalled.
His admiration for Stein the manager knew no bounds, though.
Auld’s relationship with Jock Stein was feisty at times but he admiration for his manager
Auld’s relationship with Jock Stein was feisty at times but he admiration for his manager
‘There was a warmth to Jock but if you crossed him, you knew you were in serious trouble,’ he explained. ‘He wasn’t interested in popularity contests. It was all about Celtic and the players he believed could do a job for the club.’
Auld’s love of Old Firm games was legendary. ‘I loved the rivalry,’ he said.. ‘I don’t think for one fleeting second that any other match on this planet could hold a candle to an Old Firm game. Some of them should have carried a government health warning.’
Blessed with a razor-sharp wit and an appetite for a practical joke, no one was safe from Auld.
Gemmell once recalled taking the stage in a US nightclub to sing a Frank Sinatra song and his bemusement at the vast crowd demanding encore after encore.
Auld had convinced the audience that the man with the mic was actually Danny Kaye.
Auld loved playing against Rangers and relished relished the rivalry of Old Firm matches
Auld loved playing against Rangers and relished relished the rivalry of Old Firm matches
During Celtic’s European Cup success in 1967, Auld made a significant contribution
During Celtic’s European Cup success in 1967, Auld made a significant contribution
Standing in the tunnel at Ibrox before an Old Firm game, Auld recalled Rangers skipper John Greig asking him what win bonus he was on.
‘£3,’ replied Auld. ‘Really? we’re on six,’ said Greig. ‘Aye but we’re guaranteed three,’ quipped Auld.
On another occasion, Auld once reputedly asked Jim Brogan: ‘Jim, what was your favourite moment in football, scoring the winning goal against Rangers or carrying the hamper for the Lisbon Lions?’ In 1997, Auld was asked how the Lisbon Lions would get on against the Rangers side which had just won nine-in-a-row.
‘It’d be a hard game but we’d win 2-1,’ he dead-panned. ‘Mind you, most of us are in our 50s!’ While reporters of all eras delighted in recording Auld’s quips, he was a snapper’s dream too.
After one Celtic match, he stripped to the waist, put the ball under his arm and posed while wearing a Trilby hat.
In his time as a boss, in the days before it was frowned upon, puffs of cigar smoke filled many a still.
He left Celtic for the second time in 1971, moving to Hibs and combining playing with coaching over two years before retiring.
Auld managed Patrick Thistle twice and also had spells in charge of Hibs, Hamilton and Dumbarton
Auld managed Patrick Thistle twice and also had spells in charge of Hibs, Hamilton and Dumbarton
He managed Partick Thistle twice, Hibs, Hamilton and Dumbarton.
Auld, who earned three Scotland caps, was inducted to Scottish Football Hall of Fame in 2009.
In recent years, he became a regular contributor to CelticTV and was a regular attender at matches until being diagnosed with dementia earlier this year.
On his relationship with the Celtic fans, he once said: ‘I can be walking down the road and someone will stop me to speak.
‘My family will ask me who it was but I won’t know the guy’s name. He’s just a Celtic fan….’
BERTIE AULD: AN APPRECIATION
http://celticunderground.net/bertie-auld-an-appreciation/
Posted by St Anthony | Nov 16, 2021 | Season 2021-2022 | 0 |
BERTIE AULD: AN APPRECIATION
It was Bertie Auld’s proud boast that he was perhaps the only player who signed for Celtic three times, having signed initially in 1955, then going on loan to Dumbarton in 1956, and re-joining Celtic after a spell down south with Birmingham City in 1965. But then again, Bertie Auld was remarkable in almost everything that he did.
Originally a fine left winger, Bertie had a temper on him and this led to disciplinary issues and run-ins with Celtic’s autocratic chairman, Bob Kelly. As many found to their cost, you did not cross the powerful Kelly or get on his wrong side. After being sent off for retaliation, playing for Scotland against Holland it was only a matter of time before Bertie was moved on and he was sold to Birmingham City where he made a fine impression. Birmingham reached the Fairs Cup final where they lost to AS Roma but Bertie’s time with ‘Brum’ was also littered with disciplinary problems. Rodney Marsh confirmed on Twitter just the other day of the time he once witnessed Bertie play against Fulham where he head butted the legendary English international, Johnny Haynes, then proceeded to knock out Fulham’s Maurice Cook with a punch, before proceeding to simply walk off the pitch.
Celtic were in dire straits in early 1965 with no major trophies won since 1957. Drastic action was needed and a deal was done to take Jock Stein from Easter Road to Parkhead in March 1965. Stein knew Auld was pining for home so Celtic moved quickly to bring Bertie back to Celtic Park before Jock himself had even arrived. The effect was instantaneous. Bertie scored 5 goals on his debut against Airdrie and proceeded to help Celtic to the final of the Scottish Cup. The club had not won a trophy for 8 long years and the Scottish Cup final replay defeats of 1961 and 1963, to Dunfermline and Rangers respectively, had left terrible mental scars with both the supporters and the players. This Celtic side were viewed as failures and something had to change.
The 1965 Scottish Cup final is arguably Celtic’s most important game in their history. Twice Dunfermline took the lead before Bertie twice pulled Celtic back level. His first goal was a remarkable effort when the outjumped the Pars’ keeper after Charlie Gallagher’s shot had flew high on the air off the crossbar. Billy McNeill’s late winning goal is the stuff of legend but it should be noted that Bertie carried a nervous young Celtic team on that day. From that day forward, Celtic’s fortunes were changed utterly.
Stein now took full control at Celtic and his master stroke was to convert Bertie from his left wing beat to being a midfield playmaker. Now wiser, and far more disciplined, Bertie and Bobby Murdoch became the engine room of Stein’s great Celtic side. Bertie gave Celtic an essential blend of both guile and steel. In 1966-67 Celtic won every competition they entered. The first trophy won was the League Cup against Rangers and Bertie created the winning goal, with a glorious long ball to the back post for Joe McBride to head down for the inrushing Bobby Lennox to score. A goal which was stunning in its creation and execution.
The final trophy won that season was against Inter Milan in the European Cup final in Lisbon. That game was arguably won in the tunnel. As the tanned Inter players lined up looking like Adonises, Bertie quickly clicked that the Celtic players may have picked up an inferiority complex so he began singing the Celtic song with all the players joining in, chests out and heads high, marching on to the pitch. Psychologically it was a master stroke and Celtic went on to destroy Inter in the most one sided of finals even although the score was only 2-1.
Between Bertie arriving in 1965 and departing in 1971, Celtic won an astonishing 15 out of a possible 19 domestic trophies. During this spell, Bertie became one of Celtic’s all-time greats, the epitome of the Glaswegian term, ‘Gallus’. He also had that very distinctive look, with the five o’clock shadow, the diamond white smile and that mop of thick black hair. Bertie cut a unique figure on the field of play.
It was perhaps in the European arena that he was at his most effective. The European Cup ties in 1970 against Fiorentina and Leeds gave him the great stage which he needed to display his creative play and guile which guided Celtic to another European Cup final. In his last season with Celtic in 1970-71, the Celts were pushed all the way by Aberdeen and Bertie enjoyed an Indian summer with many Celtic supporters recalling the 8-1 win at Dens Park in January 1971 when he was at his amazing best. His last game was against Clyde in May 1971, with the league won, when a large crowd turned out to pay tribute to the Lisbon Lions, who collectively played their last game as a team minus injured goalkeeper, Ronnie Simpson. It was only fitting that the Celtic players carried Bertie off the pitch shoulder high at the end, much to the delight of the Parkhead crowd. This was the stuff of legend.
Although Celtic would continue to be successful, something was missing when Bertie departed for Hibernian. In the 1972 and 1974 European Cup semi-finals, against Inter Milan and Atletico Madrid respectively, Celtic failed to score in 390 minutes of football over four games. The feeling remains that a Bertie Auld would have added the craft and cunning that Celtic missed on those occasions and thus two more European Cup finals were narrowly missed. Gerry McNee once stated that the Lisbon Lions had four players who were undoubtedly world class. Bertie was one of them (the others were Gemmell, Murdoch and Johnstone) and Stein never managed to replace the guile Auld brought to the team.
Bertie had a fine managerial career with Partick Thistle and Hibs later on in his football career. In 1978 he was said to be on a 3 man short-leet for the Celtic manager’s job to replace the great Stein, a post which Billy McNeill was always going to get. However, it would have been interesting to see what Bertie could have achieved as a Celtic manager as he had a very astute football brain.
In later years Bertie was regarded as being a legend in his own lifetime. Stories about him are legendary and everyone will have their own selection of favourites. In the mid 1980’s Jim Baxter claimed in the media that Rangers fine early 1960’s side was better than the Lisbon Lions. Ever the defender of the Celtic faith, Bertie’s response was swift and to the point –‘Tell Jim he’s welcome up to my house and I’ll show him medals that he’s never seen!’
In 1987, there were many 20th anniversary celebrations for the Lisbon Lions to mark their 1967 European Cup success. Celtic had experienced a poor season with Mo Johnston, Brian McClair, and Alan McInally all skulking away from the club at the season’s end. An emotional Bertie told a huge crowd of his pride of signing for Celtic three times and ‘would sign for a fourth time if his legs could carry him.’ He was a reminder at an important time in the club’s history of what a real Celtic player should be.
On a personal level I took my son to Parkhead in 2013 to purchase Willie Wallace’s new autobiography for his Granda’s birthday. As we walked towards the superstore I was aware of Bertie coming towards me from the side. To my delight he stopped to talk and made a fuss of junior, then aged 9. I told the boy that this was the great Bertie Auld, who was his Granda’s favourite player. Afterwards my son asked me how I knew Bertie Auld and I said that was the first time I’d ever met him. That was the effect Bertie had on people. He had time for everyone.
The Good Lord has now come calling. Come in number 10 your time is up.
Rest in peace Bertie. You’ll never realise how much we are in your debt.
Kenny Dalglish: Bertie was as good as gold
By Joe Sullivan
https://www.celticfc.com/news/2021/november/15/kenny-dalglish–bertie-was-as-good-as-gold/
Bertie Auld was brought up in Panmure Street, which straddles the indistinct border between Maryhill and Possil, and it’s because of its frontier status between both areas and the fact that his row of tenements seemingly never belonged to either area, that Bertie quipped, “That’s where I learned to run…run very fast!”
Indeed Panmure Thistle was one of his early teams, and, around 10 years later while he was between stints at his beloved Hoops, a couple of free-kicks along the road from Panmure Street, a young Kenny Dalglish was treading the turf with Possil YM.
A few years later still, they would team up at Celtic Park – one a Lisbon Lion, the other a wide-eyed teenage prospect – and Bertie Auld instilled a life-lesson in Kenny Dalglish that lives with him ‘til this day.
Speaking to the official Celtic website, Kenny said: “Bertie was bought up quite close to where I was brought up, on the north side of Glasgow, so whether he thought that a wee boy from up there needed a bit of help, or whether it was out of the generosity of his heart, I don’t know, but certainly myself, and all the young boys at that time, he always had time for you.
“He was always there if you needed something. If it wasn’t serious he would crack a joke and have a laugh and a chuckle.
‘And as well as being what he was on the pitch, off the pitch he was well worth the value in the dressing room.’
“He was a fantastic character as well as a fantastic player, and that is pretty synonymous with the Lions team, because it’s not a co-incidence that the Lions educated a lot of the younger boys that were there at the same time.
“Because they were that good on the pitch, it didn’t necessarily follow that they would be good to others, but as far as I experienced, every one of them was as good as gold – and Bertie maybe more so because he came back down to play a few games with the reserves when we were there, and he was nothing but helpful.”
Although Bertie and Kenny’s playing careers crossed paths in the Hoops, the ‘aulder’ Celt was actually a Celtic a 1950s team-mate of the late 1960s coaching staff who by then ran the rule over both players.
Kenny added: “It was important to have the people at the top who led by example – Jock Stein, Sean Fallon, Neilly Mochan, Willie Fernie – obviously in the footballing world, it was brilliant for us, but as people, that can only come from your education through life and your education through your football team, they were brilliant as well.
“And the wee man was 100 per cent street-wise. On the pitch he was like an old fox, and as good a player as he was, he was also playing into a lot of other people’s minds and we got the benefit of that.”
BertieAuldCrowd.jpg
He added: “The Celtic supporters revered him, they knew how good he was, and he knew how much the success of the club meant to them.
“I think the punters always need people that can relate to them, and they can relate to as well. And the wee man – 100 per cent, everybody could relate to him, and he had a great relationship with the punters.
“And for us as young boys playing with him, it was a fantastic education, both in the footballing world, and also life itself.
“He was just a fantastic character, I’m sure the people that visited the lounges at Celtic Park and went to the supporters’ dinners to hear him speak, they loved him as well.”
Reserves.jpg
Another famous quip of Bertie’s was that, “We trained all week and on a Saturday we got the day off to play football.” Well, his influence on the Lions was plain to see every Saturday, but his impact on the Lisbon side’s successors, the Quality Street Gang, may not have been so obvious, but it was vital nonetheless.
Kenny recalled: “He was certainly influential in the success of the football club. Myself, Danny McGrain, Lou Macari, George Connelly, Davie Hay, Paul Wilson, Vic Davidson – he left a mark on people’s minds – he certainly left a mark on mine.
“When you came into you work in the morning, he just lit the place up.”
Bertie – Tiny Wharton and Red Mist at Birmingham City
By David Potter 17 November, 2021
https://thecelticstar.com/bertie-tiny-wharton-and-red-mist-at-birmingham-city/
The next story about Bertie goes back to his Birmingham City days, to 7 December 1961.
Birmingham were playing in the Inter Cities Fairs Cup against Espanol, to whom they were 2-5 down from the first leg. There had been a little history there and Bertie had fallen out with a brutal character called Ribas.
When everyone arrived for the second leg at St Andrews, Bertie noticed that the referee was Tom “Tiny” Wharton from Glasgow, and the two of them knew each other even though their social backgrounds were different – the gallus and streetwise Bertie from Maryhill and the refined Tom from Clarkston with a slight patronising air and patrician accent. Bertie said to his Birmingham team mates “The referee is Scottish! Ah ken him. Leave him tae me, boys”.
So during the warm up, Bertie approached Tom. There was about a foot difference in height, and goodness knows how much in girth and build, for Tom was a big man, and only called “Tiny” because he was anything but. The conversation between the two of them ran as follows.
“Hello Tom. Dae ye mind o’ me?”
“Yes, I do, Mr Auld. How are you?
“Fine, Tom. Dae ye realise that we are the only two Scotsmen on the park, and we are baith Glaswegians?”
“Yes, I do, Mr Auld.”
“Ah wis wonderin, Tom, seeing as how we are baith Glaswegians…there’s a fella called Ribas. I wonder if ah were tae gie him a “dull one”, if you could maybe turn a blind eye? Seein as how we are baith Glaswegians?
“Mr Auld, I am going to pretend that I did not hear that! Good bye”
So the game started and the Brum were making no impression on this solid but brutal Spanish side. Mr Wharton had already sent a man off from each side, and the game was approaching its conclusion when Bertie did indeed visit Senor Ribas with a “dull one”. Mr Wharton called him over and said “Mr Auld, before the game you told me that there were two Glaswegians on the park. I am afraid there is only one now, namely myself! Off!
Here’s Bertie talking about Tiny Wharton sending him off while at Birmingham with Big Yogi, George McCluskey, Dixie Deane and Jinky among the audience…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXv5qiRHHTM
SEEING RED: WEE BERTIE AND THE BIG PROBLEM WITH ‘TINY’
SEEING RED: WEE BERTIE AND THE BIG PROBLEM WITH ‘TINY’
By CQN Magazine on 17th November 2021 Latest News
MEMORIES of the incomparable Bertie Auld have been flooding back in the past few days since the sad announcement of the Celtic legend’s passing at the age of 83.
In another CQN EXCLUSIVE, here is an edited extract from his best-selling autobiography, ‘A Bhoy Called Bertie’, co-authored by his friend Alex Gordon, which may make you chuckle.
A FAIR percentage of the referees I have encountered in my many years in football are a fairly compelling argument for birth control.
You know the ones I mean; those preening peacocks who labour under the mystifying notion that a game of football is solely taking place for their benefit. These guys, misguided souls that they are, appear to be under the illusion that they are there to take centre stage while the other twenty-two blokes invading their space are merely bit-part players in their own little theatre.
Bill Shankly, the former Liverpool manager, once said of referees, ‘They may know the laws of football, but they don’t know football.’ Who am I to argue with a legend? There are only seventeen laws in football and one that isn’t there is common sense. But you know what they say about common sense, don’t you? It’s not that common and, you better believe it, I have seen match officials demonstrate that sad fact over and over again as a player, a manager and a spectator.
These guys have the powers to spoil a spectacle. Unfortunately, they often do just that. The best referees are the ones you don’t see. Unless you have been living on another planet, you will already know that Bertie Auld and match officials haven’t always seen eye-to-eye. I admit there has been the odd confrontation with authority.
BIRMINGHAM BHOY…Bertie Auld during his three and a half years at St Andrews.
Tiny Wharton was one of the most famous Scottish referees of my era. He was known as Tiny because he was about 6ft 4in and must have weighed about eighteen stone. If I am being truthful, I have to admit I didn’t particularly like the man. I thought he was arrogant and there was no love lost between Tiny and me.
I recall having a go at him after a game against Rangers at Ibrox. We were heading for the tunnel when I said to him, ‘Well played, Tiny, you gave us nothing today.’ He looked at me and said, ‘I’m sure I awarded Celtic a shy at some point.’ I didn’t see the funny side.
I’m sure Jinky wasn’t a fan, either. Tiny sent him off twice and I recall one came against Rangers in a New Year’s Day game at Ibrox. Jinky had been fouled a few times, but completely lost the rag in the second-half when he assaulted – there’s no other word – Rangers’ Icelandic midfield player Therolf Beck.
I can’t imagine what the Rangers lad had done to warrant such treatment from our little winger. Beck, as I recall, was a player of slight stature and was never going to be famous for throwing his weight around. Jinky just lunged at him, though, and, before Tiny got the opportunity to order him off, our winger just turned round and raced straight up the tunnel. He didn’t need to be psychic to realise what was coming next.
I’M IN CHARGE…Bertie Auld on the ball.
When I was at Birmingham City, Tiny refereed a Fairs Cup-tie against Espanol at St.Andrews in 1963. It was the second leg against the Spaniards and we had lost 3-1 in the first game. It had been a really bad-tempered affair and our opponents were into all sorts of dirty off-the-ball antics. The referee was weak and allowed them to get away with all sorts of stuff.
However, we knew we still had to play them at our place, so we thought we would get our own back. First and foremost, obviously, we wanted to win the tie, but I know a few of my team-mates had earmarked a couple of our opponents for some ‘special’ treatment, if you catch my drift.
I had been walloped just before the full-time whistle in the first game. This bloke just charged into my back and sent me flying. I looked up and saw he was wearing the No.2 jersey. ‘I’ll remember that number,’ I thought. Before the second leg, my colleagues were urging me to talk to Tiny and see if we could possibly get him leaning just a shade in our favour. Like that was going to happen!
The Birmingham team back then consisted of mainly English players, as you might expect, but there were a couple of Welsh and Irish lads, too. I was the only Scot.
READ ALL ABOUT IT…Bertie Auld poses with the European Cup at Parkhead during the launch of his autobiography, ‘A Bhoy Called Bertie’ in 2008.
Tiny, as usual, came into our dressing room before kick-off to inspect our boots. I said, ‘Well, how about that, you and me the only Scots on the pitch in a big European tie?’ Tiny didn’t respond. While he was looking at our studs I told my team-mates, ‘Tiny is a great referee. He won’t allow anything like we had to tolerate in Spain.’
Tiny ignored my wise words to my colleagues. When he left the dressing room I warned them, ‘Don’t give him any backchat – he won’t stand for that. His first warning is also his final warning. Watch yourselves.’ I wish I had taken my own advice!
The game had barely started when I saw their No.2 going for a loose ball. It was either him or me as I went into the tackle. I caught him and he yelped in pain.
Tiny knew me well enough, but never called me Bertie – it was always Mr.Auld. He passed me and said, ‘Don’t think that tackle went unnoticed, Mr.Auld.’
Some time later I saw my opportunity for a bit more retribution. I nailed the guy again and once more he went down like a sack of spuds. Tiny came over to me and said, ‘Remember when you said there would be two Scots on the pitch tonight, Mr.Auld? Now there’s only going to be one. Off you go!’
And that was the end of the game for yours truly.
By the way, I later discovered that the Espanol No.2 I hammered twice at St.Andrews was a replacement right-back for the guy who had played in the first game. The poor bloke must have wondered what he had done to incur my wrath that night.