Celtic Park's Opening Games

30 years ago – in July 1996 - the Lisbon Lions stand was opened at Celtic Park, continuing the ground’s redevelopment. There are four stands at Celtic Park: the main stand, North Stand, Lisbon Lions stand and Jock Stein stand. Each time one these has been opened, matches have been held to celebrate this. The original Celtic Park opened in 1888 before 1892 when the Bhoys moved the short distance to the second site, which remains the location where the Celts play. Over the years, the look of this venue has changed significantly, with many stands and structures being built and then knocked down, and in the case of the original pavilion, burned down as happened in 1929. If looking at the current Parkhead, the history of this can be traced back to 1971, when the main stand was built, although the foundations of this are much older. The oldest of Celtic’s stands is the main stand. Work on this began in 1970 and was eventually completed in 1971. It ran behind schedule which led to one very strange scenario. By 14 August 1971, the League Cup campaign had begun but Celtic could not yet play at home due to the building works. This meant that their match versus Rangers had to be played at Ibrox – but with Celtic as the home team, and Celtic season tickets being valid! 11 days later, the main stand was finally ready for use. In terms of opening games for this new facility, there are two relevant fixtures. The first of these came in the League Cup on 25 August. Morton travelled to Celtic Park and the main stand was now open for fans. To say the least, this was a less than auspicious occasion to mark the stand’s maiden game. Despite getting a penalty – which was missed by Kenny Dalglish – the Celts fell to a 1-0 defeat. Although Celtic still made it through to the final, they famously lost 4-1 to Partick Thistle. However, this Morton fixture was not the main stand’s official opening event. Instead, that took place a week when Nacional from Uruguay were the glamour opponents invited to mark the occasion. 60,000 supporters were in Celtic Park, with the main stand being ticket-only and sold out. They watched on as Celtic legend Jimmy McGrory – the club’s all-time top scorer and former manager – performed the official ceremony. This was a much brighter moment as the Hoops won 3-0 to officially christen the new stand with victory. Although there were also complaints from the Scottish League who were upset at the game being played during the season, despite the Scottish FA agreeing to this. In the following decades, little major reconstruction work took place at Celtic Park. By the early-1990s, this left the club facing a major problem. The Hillsborough tragedy had led to a demand that all football stadiums be all-seated. In this era, Celtic faced major financial problems and simply did not have the money to build such a venue. Pipe dreams of moving to Cambuslang soon disappeared. Eventually, this led to Fergus McCann’s takeover, after which there was rapid building progress at Celtic Park. In the 1994-95 season, the Bhoys vacated their usual home and instead played at Hampden. Whilst they were away, Celtic Park was razed to the ground, except for the main stand. Building work soon followed at a cost of £17 million. In place of the old Jungle section of the ground, a massive new North Stand was built. Quite simply, this towered over what had been the former ground. Also, with seats for 27,000 supporters, this was one of the biggest stands in Britain. By 1995, everything looked brighter again for Celtic. The takeover had long since been completed, the Bhoys had held a successful share issue to raise much needed funds and, most importantly, the club’s first silverware since 1989 sat in the Parkhead trophy room. In addition, the North Stand was now finished and ready for an official opening. On a gala day on 5 August 1995, fans got their first experience of this new venue. A sell-out crowd turned up in Glasgow’s east end, with the brilliant sunshine