Ah the good old days. A year before the 1967 Summer of Love kicked off and a potpourri of hippies coverged in San Francisco’s Haight Ashbury district, a gathering of Hoops players assembled in the Californian city’s Kezar Stadium for a friendly encounter with Bayern Munich. Peace and love, man? Not quite. The 60s would be swinging in more ways than one.
“Stevie Chalmers got hooked by their full back Adolph Kuntswald,” recalled the Lisbon Lion John Clark as he reflected on a fairly rambunctious rammy with the Germans over half a century ago.
Tomorrow night in the Bavarian capital, hostilities will resume between these two grand old sides as the Champions League group stages roar on. Back in 1966, Celtic were on a tour of North America and arrived at the aforementioned Kezar Stadium, a venue which would go on to stage a famous scene in Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry. Do I feel lucky? Kuntswald must have felt so.
After the German had plonked a fist on Chalmers’ mouth, all hell broke loose as the Celtic man set off in fevered pursuit of his assailant in a chaotic frenzy that loosely resembled the chase scene which accompanied the end credits in an episode of the Benny Hill Show.
“Stevie chased him right along the touchline trying to get retribution,” added Clark, who was at Hampden Park on Sunday to be inducted into the Scottish Football Hall of Fame along with the rest of those famed Lisbon Lions.
“It ended up a bit of a free for all. It was quite comical because they were chasing each other and players were running after them and the fans were running at the back of us. We got to the tunnel and the gate was locked so we were all stuck there
Some 12,000 spectators attended that particular match with a fair few of them joining the melee. The general crash, bang, wallop was done and dusted in seven minutes and when play got back underway, Celtic eventually equalised through Joe McBride as an eventful, explosive affair ended in a 2-2 draw. “German teams have always been the same, organised at the back and clinical up front,” added Clark. “Gerd Muller and Sepp Maier both played in that game.”
If the current crop of Celtic players come away from Munich with a share of the spoils tomorrow, they’ll probably hang out the bunting on London Road. The rousing 3-0 victory over Anderlecht on Belgian soil in their last Champions League outing has emboldened the Glasgow side. By all accounts, third place, and at least a Europa League spot, is now Celtic’s for the taking with the general wisdom dictating that Bayern and PSG will ultimately dominate the group and plough on into the last 16.
Read more: Money in Europe is ridiculous, says Celtic great Jim Craig
Clark is not overly keen on buying into that theory, mind you. “People talk about aiming for third but a club like Celtic should never aim for third,” said the 76-year-old. “They should always go for the best they can get. Football is a funny game and you never know what can happen. You have to look at PSG and Bayern as the big boys in Europe but we’ll see what they can do on the night.”
With the financial might of Bayern and PSG, though, Clark is well aware of the vast gulf in resources. “The finances are getting out of hand and there’s not much being pumped into Scottish football,” he conceded. “The investment in Britain stops at Carlisle. Scotland doesn’t get any of the cash swirling about but in a one-off occasion you never know. As long as you’ve got a goal scorer you’ve got a chance and Celtic have that in Leigh Griffiths.”
And if the worst comes to the worst, a Celtic player could always take a swing at Robert Lewandowski?
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