SPORTING HISTORY will reflect only one verdict on the Scottish Cup quarter-final clash on Sunday – the tie at Ibrox was won on penalties by Celtic after 120 minutes of insanely exciting but relentlessly low-quality chaos.
But the verdict on the post-match conflict on the pitch is still being considered as Scotland, Scottish football and the Scottish police try to make sense out of the extraordinary scenes that played out on the pitch after Celtic scored their fourth penalty to book a semi-final spot at Hampden.
But what really happened during the Battle of Ibrox? We’ve been analysing footage of what took place on the Ibrox turf in the tempestuous 15 minutes after Tomáš Cvancara wheeled away in celebration after his decisive kick. The most compelling and important images are from the live Premier Sport coverage, but there is also a plethora of mobile phone footage and still photos online. The reality of events on the day bears little resemblance to the ‘both sides are as bad as each other’ favoured by the Scottish, Irish and British media.
Back of the net!
After three expertly converted Celtic penalties, two Rangers misses and two conversions, substitute striker Tomáš Čvančara drills his shot low to the right of Rangers keeper Jack Butland in front of stunned Rangers fans in the Copland Stand to send the Bhoys to Hampden for the Scottish Cup semi-final.
DECISIVE: Tómaš Čvančara wheels away in delight after converting the winning penalty
As the rangy Czech spreads his arms in front of the Rangers fans in celebration, Celtic fans in the front row of the 7,500 capacity Broomloan Stand 100 metres behind him spill on to the pitch to celebrate the unlikeliest of wins. A desperately under-strength Celtic team which has played four away games in ten games has survived a 120-minute battering and hold their nerve in the impossibly tense spot-kick duel while Rangers come apart in front of their expectant fans. The Celtic players who are gathered in the centre-circle to watch the shoot-out race towards the ecstatic Čvančara and the group makes its way back towards the ecstatic fans around the Celtic goal in the Broomloan Stand.
Keep off the grass
Fans leaving the stands to access the pitch is a big no-no in the game all over the world. But it happens. Indeed, in the 99th minute, deep into extra time, around 30 Rangers fans manage to exit the Sandy Jardine stand to celebrate with Rangers players after it appears that the home team has taken the league with a goal that is eventually ruled out for handball. The incident takes place near the corner flag, close to the Celtic fans in the Broomloan Stand, but despite some light goading from the intruding Rangers fans, it passes without incident. Fast forward to game's end and footage of the Celtic fans behind the Broomloan nets and in the 18-yard box shows them in celebratory mood, intent on accessing players and staff and securing selfies with the players.
EUPHORIC: Fans entered the playing area to access the players
Pitch ‘invasions’ are common in Scotland, Ireland, England and Wales, particularly towards the end of seasons, with league success or survival at stake and the cup competitions in their final stages. Fans on the pitch is a phenomenon fully expected and planned for. This one is all but inevitable. As the Celtic fans, players and staff mill around the goalmouth area, a number of Rangers fans way down at the other end, many of them wearing blue Lycra balaclavas with the red Scottish lion rampant printed on the face, begin drifting on to the pitch from the Copland Stand directly opposite the away fans. Premier Sport commentator Rory Hamilton is in no doubt about what he is seeing. “Supporters [are] making their way on to the pitch at both ends of the stadium, Celtic in celebration, Rangers fans in retaliation.”
The thin high-vis line
After around two minutes of Celtic players, management and fans interacting on the pitch, Celtic staff in club tracksuits begin tugging at and signalling to the Celtic players to leave the field. As Celtic players make their way towards the sideline, a Rangers fan aims a kick at Celtic full-back Julián Araujo. The fiery Mexican turns to confront his attacker, but is hustled onwards and away. A Rangers fan in a grey top attacks a member of the Celtic backroom team, reported to be the team’s fitness coach. After a melée involving Celtic players, staff and police, the man is led away by two police officers.
MELÉE: A Rangers fan is led away after a confrontation on the pitch
As the attacker in the grey shirt is being apprehended, scores of Rangers fans, the vast majority dressed in ‘Union Bears Ultras’ black, are sprinting towards the Celtic penalty box as police and stewards in high-vis jackets desperately try to assemble a human barrier across the 18-yard line.
One of the Rangers fans advancing towards the Broomloan is carrying a smoking flare that's burning a perhaps fitting shade of bright orange. He launches it into the Celtic fans in the stand as he nears the high-vis line. Exactly 10 seconds later the flare is thrown back on the pitch from the stand. The spread-out Rangers fans pull up short of the police and stewards line, gathering en masse at the right-hand corner of the penalty box D. By this stage no Celtic fans, players or staff are left on the field. A Rangers fan in a blue balaclava punches a steward in the face and the steward – dressed in an orange high-vis jacket – falls to the ground.
Head to head?
Despite the chaotic nature of events, the number of instances of fan-on-fan violence is tiny. One of the few takes place just seconds after Celtic win the game as Celtic fans spill into the playing area to celebrate. A Rangers fan in a grey top advances from the Sandy Jardine stand to confront Celtic fans near the corner flag. He clashes with Celtic fans and falls down, at which point stewards intervene and he is led back to where he came from. At the high point of the Rangers fans’ advance towards the Celtic end, a single young Rangers fan dressed in a grey and black hoodie breaches the high-vis line, sprints into the Celtic penalty box and lands a flying kick to the head of a Celtic supporter, who falls to the ground.
DROP KICK: A young Rangers fan kicks a rival fan to the ground in the Celtic penalty box
These are the only two instances of fans actually coming together that we’ve been able to find, although with new footage emerging by the hour, that may change. Large-scale clashes do not develop since the large crowd of Rangers fans which runs the length of the pitch stops abruptly at the thin line of police and stewards and the 7,500 Celtic fans in the Broomloan stay where they are.
Who went where?
The evidence is stark and overwhelming, even if it makes grim reading for Rangers fans: Not a single Celtic fan crosses the halfway line and indeed only a minuscule number leave the 18-yard box – and that's to wander towards Celtic players or staff. The well-known loyalist Jamie Bryson – who will spend the entire evening after the match tweeting furiously about the game – speaks for many angry Rangers fans when he says in a selfie-statement after the game: “They [Celtic fans] then invaded the pitch, obviously they were intending on attacking Rangers players.” There is precisely zero evidence of Celtic fans approaching Rangers players, much less attacking them. Indeed, no Rangers players cross the centre line to come anywhere near the celebrating Celtic fans and players. Indeed, when the main attack wave of Union Bears Ultras begins sprinting towards the Broomloan there are four Rangers players in sight: three are about to enter the tunnel side by side and shaking hands with three Celtic players, and one is in the Rangers half engaged in a clearly relaxed conversation with another person.
RELAXED: Rangers players leaving the pitch and in relaxed conversation as a Rangers fan is subdued in the Celtic half
But perhaps Mr Bryson’s oddest attempt at blame-shifting is to point out in that post-match selfie-statement that Celtic fans have damaged the Broomloan Stand and scrawled sectarian graffiti on the walls. These incidents are being investigated by Police Scotland, but not a single one of the fans who invade the pitch know anything about them as they rush the Celtic end. This information will only become available after the stadium has emptied and Rangers staff begin the clean-up. A stark illustration of the reality of what happened after the match are the aerial images of Ibrox showing the vast majority of the pitch empty and a large crowd of Rangers fans pressing up against the line of police and stewards in front of the Celtic fans.
Post-match analysis
The return of Celtic fans in big numbers to Ibrox for the first time in eight years was always going to bring challenges – and that turned out to be the case. Arrests have begun – nine at the time of writing – and if Police Scotland, Rangers or Celtic identify fans who damaged the Broomloan or scrawled graffiti mocking the death of 66 Rangers fans, then not only should life bans should follow, court dates should too. But the big story of the day was the pitch incursions and the most cursory examination of the mass of evidence readily available gives the lie to the idea that both fans were equally to blame. Yes, Celtic fans accessed the pitch and that should not happen; but their motivation was clearly celebratory, as evidenced by their demeanour and their keenness to get to Celtic players and staff for selfies and embraces. The fact that they remained inside the 18-yard box is clear and unambiguous evidence of their intentions. The Rangers fans, on the other hand, were masked and clearly aggressive in their demeanour, covering 100 metres at a rapid pace with no intention other than to get at Celtic fans celebrating at their own end.
A PICTURE PAINTS A THOUSAND WORDS: The last of the Celtic fans leave the pitch as Rangers Ultras besiege police and stewards
Ludicrous claims of ‘protecting our players’ and ‘protecting our stadium’ immediately collapse on any cursory examination of the movement and behaviour of both sets of fans. If we can expand the military analogy to conclude this analysis, the Battle of Ibrox was not a conflict fought on neutral territory, rather it was an invasion of the away fans’ territory by the home fans. And perhaps most tellingly of all, with only a thin line of around 25 police and stewards separating the 7,500 in green and white in the Broomloan from around 250 baying Rangers Ultras, the Broomloan masses stayed put. Had they not, this would be an entirely different story.
