We have a combined book review/Mary’s Meals promotion today. Celtic fan and politician, Jim Murphy, has written an excellent book, The 10 Football Matches That Changed The World. It’s in my top three books on the game (as opposed to a player), and gives insight into the deadly intimidation which sparked the Barcelona-Real Madrid rivalry, how the game was rescued from oblivion, and England’s public schools, by a handful of communities in the 19th Century, Hillsborough, standpoints against racism in the UK and a whole lot more.
Romantics forever mourn that the great Hungarian team lost the 1954 World Cup Final, but that game changed for post-war West Germany. Then there’s Robben Island, apartheid’s most feared opponents were locked up for decades, denied all but a football. With that ball, teams were built, men were built.
Profits from sales of the book through the link at the bottom of the page go to our Mary’s Meals appeal. Here’s the interview:
Q. OK, Jim, you’ve written a fine book, but I have to open with a question as charged as anything in the world football could be. On meeting then-Rangers chairman, Craig Whyte, you opened with “When do you think Rangers first decided on a ‘No Catholics’ policy?” Did you appreciate the enormity, and rarity, of that question? Would Scotland benefit from being open about what happened inside the game here?
“Looking back it’s hard to believe that the country tolerated that old style sectarianism. Growing up in Glasgow it was treated by far too many as the norm when it was anything but normal. My one and only encounter with the ill-fated Craig Whyte, the calamitous and short-lived Rangers chairman took place in the most unlikely of places. It was in the board room at Celtic Park, at half-time in the infamous 2011 Scottish Cup match.
“As part of my research for the book I decided to ask him about the history of the Club that he would go on to cause so much harm to. I asked Mr Whyte, ‘When do you think Rangers first decided on a “No Catholics” policy?’ He took such a direct question surprisingly well. Perhaps because I was asking him about a Rangers from what now seems like another age. Pretty fairly, he couldn’t place a date on it.
“For decades, his club was probably the only team in the world where the question of which foot you kicked with was more important than how well you could kick. Only a few yards along the corridor, in the Rangers changing room, no one knew how many Catholics were sitting listening to the Rangers manager Ally McCoist’s half-time team-talk. More importantly, no one really cared.
“Thinking back its inexplicable why so many in the media, football, UEFA, politics and others had accepted such a policy for so long. It was from an era when there was little protection against discrimination against ethnic or religious minorities, the disabled or on the grounds of sexuality and even against women. None of those things were right and nor was any sectarianism wherever it came from or who it was aimed at.
“I spoke to some of the best Celtic and Rangers historians there are. Celtic’s origins are rightly and universally celebrated but for decades much less was spoken of Rangers earliest days. But the passions of the Club’s founders the canoeing McNeil brothers had nothing to do with other people’s subsequent prejudices. For years when Rangers had a free Saturday their players sometimes turned up to watch Celtic and were welcomed by the sound of Celtic fans’ applause rather than any boos.
“In 1909 both sets of supporters invaded and rioted on the Hampden pitch after a drawn final. Parts of Hampden were set alight, fans fought with the police and some fireman were set upon when they turned up to save the stadium. Astonishingly there’s no reports in any of the media of rival fans throwing even a single punch at one another.
“But by 1924 events including post First World War anti-Catholic sentiment and the opening of Harland and Wolff shipyard in Govan helped contort Rangers. It was revealing to interview Graeme Souness, the manager who broke Celtic hearts by signing Mo Johnston and in so doing helped break a sixty year taboo. Talking to Billy McNeil about all of this was pretty enlightening.”
Q. Racism was rife in British football in the 70s and 80s and you give some inside into the tide turning after Chelsea fans booing their own black player on a day they won promotion in 1984, but if you look around Britain today, or even some football grounds, do you feel as though we have slid back after recent years or recession and shortage?
“Football has come a long way to challenge the racism that had been tolerated on the pitch and celebrated on the terraces; accepted in the boardroom and in far too many changing rooms. No Club was exempt from the racism, not even Celtic. I remember being at Celtic Park and how angry I felt about the treatment of Mark Walters. We’ve all come a long way since then.
“But there’s still racist and other attitudes to be challenged. Anti-gay sentiment is still considered acceptable by a lot of football people. And football isn’t immune from the anti-Muslim attitudes that survive in wider society.”
Q. The Real Madrid-Barcelona rivalry is the most intense still alive in the game but its roots, and the roots of both clubs, as you explain, are difficult to pin to a single game. Do you think this is more about the struggle for Spain across the 20th century? Barcelona, as much as any club in the world, have a duty to live up to historical expectations. Do you think this is possible in the modern world?
“No other sporting rivals have been so trapped by the multiple and often tragic identities of their country. As a consequence of the brutality inflicted on Barca and Catalonia by Franco, Barcelona set themselves standards that they are finding it hard to live up to. The allegations on transfer kick-backs, tax problems and ties to Qatar 2022 are out of kilter with the often utopian ideals that Barca sometimes encourage. And now we have the signing of Suarez. I’m not sure the signing of this brilliant but troubled star is in keeping with the spirit of Gamper and Sunyol.
“For the unthinking many of course, there is a sense that Madrid the football club was founded by the forefathers of fascist neanderthals. In truth Real were formed by left-wingers. But at a time when Franco was a pariah, Real were world beaters. He simply sided with Spain’s greatest export. The Real Madrid of the late Di Stefano were transformed into his unofficial global ambassadors.
“In writing about Barca and Madrid I was spoilt for choice about which game cemented the political and cultural conflict that became the story of the two Clubs. The contenders are: 1925, when a British Royal Marine band came to play; 1943, with Madrid’s biggest ever victory; and, lastly, a sending-off in 1970 that never should have been. I opted for the cup semi-final of 1943. Barca were 3-0 up after the home leg and favourites to go through. But after a threatening pre-match visit to their changing room by the Director of State Security Barca managed to lose the return leg 11-1.
“To fathom what happened in 1943, you need to understand something about the one event in Spain’s history that has influenced politics, the nation’s football and culture for decades. For those who lost family it’s the heartbreak of modern Spain. For many football fans it’s the emotional backdrop to the Barca v Madrid rivalry. In his brilliant book ‘The Spanish Civil War’ Antony Beevor wrote of the conflict that, ‘It is perhaps the best example of a subject which becomes more confusing when it is simplified.’ Read his book to see what he means.
“In early 1936 Spain had a democratically elected left wing Popular Front government. It was rocked by an attempted military coup that summer by its right wing opponents. For three years Spain fought and with Hitler’s support Franco triumphed. Barca President Josep Sunyol was assassinated by fascists.
“Franco was vengeful against a defeated Catalonia and often defiant Barca. Its the memories of those horrors that live today for many in Spanish football.”
Q. Football and feelings of national image have had a mostly unfortunate relationship but you tell a different story for the 1954 World Cup Final, between the great Hungarian team and West Germany. Hungary were robbed of a deserved national highlight but you think Germany won more than just a football match?
“We’ve all just enjoyed a great World Cup with Germany winning for a fourth time. The one big surprise was that the hosts conceded more goals than any other nation. Its hard to say what the impact on Brazilian psyche is going to be. But there’s little doubt about the effect on the West Germany psyche of 1954 – the most important World Cup final ever played.
“That Bern final was played against the Puskas inspired unbeatable Hungarians. Franz Beckenbauer, the man who would go on to win the World Cup for West Germany, both as a player and manager, believes that, after their success, ‘suddenly Germany was somebody again’. And reflecting the experiences of his own childhood he knew how an eighty-fourth minute winner by Helmut Rahn changed Germany’s view of itself. ‘For anybody who grew up in the misery of the post-war years, Bern was an extraordinary inspiration. The entire country regained its self-esteem.’”
Q. Football is the sport of the people in South Africa, your childhood home, but the story of the role the game played in the lives of inmates – and future statesmen – on Robben Island in 1967, unfortunately, goes largely untold. How did this game reach into the hearts of Mandela, Zuma and their contemporaries, through such hardship?
“My family emigrated to South Africa in the early 1980’s and I lived there until the South African army came knocking on the door looking for me to serve two years national service. I’m neither a coward nor a pacifist but there was no way I was going to serve in an apartheid army.
“When I lived there Nelson Mandela and so many others were jailed on the former leper colony of Robben Island. Every morning I could see across to the Atlantic Island. There was very little news from the island. Like most people I had no idea about the Makana league that the prisoners had forced the regime to allow them to set up. It was inspired by British football. Aston Villa fan Tony Suze got it going.
“Many of the prisoners idolised Billy Bremner. A lot of the teams were named after British clubs. Current South African President Jacob Zuma was a tough tackling centre-back for a team called Rangers!
“One of the ANC’s former island political prisoners I interviewed Dikgang Moseneke was clear about how football helped keep hope alive. ‘It was the great escape from imprisonment. I don’t think the governor and wardens understood the full meaning of the football that they allowed us to play. Very few people came out of Robben Island broken, very few, And some went on to become leaders.’
Q. It is clear that you enjoyed writing the book but the final chapter, Liverpool v Nottingham Forest, 1989; the Hillsborough Disaster is haunting. More than the sectarianism which through football was institutionalised in Scotland in 1924, or the Soccer War game, between El Salvador and Honduras, it reaches inside the reader to touch regret and sorrow, in particular with Trevor Hicks account. What was the Justice for the 96 campaign up against, as they set about trying to change the world?
“Put bluntly the ‘Justice for the ’96’ campaign was up against large section of the British establishment. With the official inquests going on at the moment I have to be careful about what I say. Back then a media that was willing to repeat lies, too many police complicit in a cover up, a government too quick to blame the innocent and a country where many were initially willing to believe the worst of Liverpool fans. But over time the lies unravelled. Celtic’s solidarity with the campaigners is well known. What is less well known is that it wasn’t until a UK Cabinet meeting in Glasgow in 2008 that the campaign got its much yearned for political breakthrough.
“When I wrote the book I decided I wasn’t going to stitch anyone up; and I didn’t. But there’s one person who it’s impossible not to be angry with – the odious then Sun editor, Kelvin Mackenzie. Even today he gives mediocre middle aged men the world over a bad reputation. His malevolence is matched only by his unjustified arrogance.
“But the fact that the campaigners have now got to the truth means that they might just be on the cusp of getting justice as well. Theirs is a story of working class solidarity and of a city that refused to give in. As one campaigner put it to me. ‘We always believed that the law and the establishment would always win. As The Clash would say, ” I fought the law and the law won”.’ But on this occasion, mercifully, it appears they haven’t.
Q. There is so much in the book I didn’t know about the game, specifically, including that in the early 19th century it had all-but disappeared, apart from outposts in Orkney, Shetland, Workington, Cornwall and Jedburgh, before it was colonised by Britain’s public schools and Army messes. 200 years ago, it was a game, but not a game of the people. Your story starts with how people reclaimed football and lived their lives through it. Is this the real story of football over the last two centuries?
“Football almost died. How it survived is a little known truth and is the secret that the sport rarely recognises. A single match helped rescue the sport, and, with one unexpected victory, it finally broke free from its ghettos in the nation’s public schools and British Army officers’ messes. The ailing game had been violent, with very few agreed rules. It was run by and for the elite and, in a nation with very few sports fields, had been banned from public streets. In England, the FA Cup (partly funded by Scotland’s Queens Park) was colonised by university, public school, and regimental teams.
“In the 1883 FA Cup final, the former pupils of Eton College lined up against Blackburn Olympic at the Oval cricket ground. The Lancashire team won in extra time and the trophy went home with them which was further north then ever before. It coincided with Britain’s second Industrial Revolution and meant that when people left these shores they took with them a newly proletarian sport with them.
“A new breed of football innovator was born. They were more in the image of Blackburn Olympic than Old Etonian. In South America, British railway workers helped introduce the sport to Colombia, Uruguay and Argentina. A school-teaching Scot, Alexander Watson Hutton, set up the Argentine FA. In Chile, British sailors, and in Venezuela, British miners were amongst the first to play. In Spain, Brazil and Italy, Britons also planted their working class footballing roots.
“This change in football came in time for the First World War. It meant that football was one of the few things that the working class soldiers and their public school educated officers fighting in the Western Front trenches had in common. It’s an integral part of the story of how the 1914 football Christmas Truce came about. But that’s a different story and is the one match in the book which didn’t change the world.”
If you order the book through this link, with the promotion code: CELTIC, all profits will go to Mary’s Meals.
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Oops. Should have read “Why might Nir Biton have to leave Celtic?”
Read a book a few years ago on the Mediterranean in WW2 by a history professor at Glasgow University. Very academic, detailed and interesting.
Anyway one thing he said that made an impression on me was this. The British were pretty much disliked by everyone and increasingly so as the war neared its conclusion and the reality of a fallen empire became apparent to everyone.
On the other hand the USA had never had any presence in the Med at all and before they entered the war – ie when still neutral – they secretly sent engineers to mark up the pipelines for the oil to get it from Saudi Arabia to the Med and then onwards to the States. They targeted the Med as hugely significant for American national interest post WW2 and their strategic partners in the region designed to protect this interest is the state they created. Israel could and should have been better than what it has become.
I’m totally confused. Don’t know what tonight is all about. Think I’ll wait and figure things out in the morning.
Big Cup Winners
I can agree with you on that
iki
Sorry mate,dont know where you get that from,the nearest Greek island to Turkey is Samos.The nearest they come is 3 miles.Its the 3rd largest Greek island and at one time used to belong to Turkey.Ataturk gave it to the Greeks
Gordybhoy64
So what is it you disagree with me about?
corkcelt
I’m wi you that. Me heids nippin. Night Night Timland.
Weefra HH praying to Wee Oscar.
Dear oh dear BCW ….. this is CQN not follow follow… saw a rumour on twitter earlier that chris bigot graham posts on here… is it you BCW?
Wi you on that. Sorry.
Weefra HH praying to Wee Oscar.
Smokey
Smokey
Crawls from under his stone, hoping to gang up on BCW.
Big Cup Winners,
don’t get you,i have answered that question twice,if you don’t accept my answer fair enough,if you think its something else you are mistaken,but feel free to tell me what it is
smoke and mirrors
Justify that “bigot” slur.
gordybhoy64
Your selectiveness……..
Big Cup Winners,
with regards to what,cause if I am being selective it aint intended
corkcelt
00:01 on
18 July, 2014
I’m totally confused. Don’t know what tonight is all about. Think I’ll wait and figure things out in the morning.
Its called a debate.You know,one of those things a blog is started for.One person or more debating on current issues,like Celtic,Independence,The Middle East conflict.Not too hard to get your head around,I would think.Good night all.
gordybhoy64
Fair enough.
Denia Bhoy
Shocking news thoughts and prayers are with your family at this time
Nothing to add to any of the discussions tonight
Night all HH
Pray for peace
Smokey you crawled back under yet ?
Big Cup Winners
no bother,just to add I don’t know the other poster who has commented to you,
and certainly don’t agree with what he asked you
gordybhoy64
The guy is a Hun…….surfaces every so often and has a go at me or HT. Quick as a rat up a drainpipe any-time he thinks he can sow some discord.
Big Cup Winners,
aye I have read some of his posts before,
always think he is on just to wind people up,
certainly not a Celtic fan
Firstly, my condolences to all who lost their lives in the Malaysian plane attack, of whatever nationality, and to their friends and family on CQN.
Secondly, I fear for loads of innocent Palestinians tonight caught between war-mongering factions, in a highly unequal conflict. The horror involved does not make all Israelis evil nor all on the receiving side of their attack innocent. But it remains a disproportionate response and it will sour political efforts for a long time. It takes many years to sicken of war but, eventually, there will be a sickening and old enemies will have to talk. Anyone standing on the sidelines, telling either side to “get tore into them” needs to examine their conscience.
Thirdly, it has nothing at all to do with Nir Biton, who has played football and kept his mouth shut about politics, as far as I am aware. Anyone advocating punitive action against an Israeli footballer is really introducing pettiness into politics. These issues are far more important than that.
Lastly, to The Comfortable Collective (and others). The more that our one or two (you really don’t know how many there are on the internet) resident racists drive decent posters away, the more they have won. It is a real danger. I no longer see the names of such as Celtic First, subterranean, Dick Byrne and many more on here. I know that the presence and tolerance of the unrepentant racists has discouraged some of those who have gone from these pages. I worry that more of the decent core will drift away for fear of guilt by association.
It has nothing to do with right wing politics; that is easily tolerated and I have learned to put up with that all of my life. It does have to do with glorifying thugs like the EDL and demonising people of colour. There is no equivalent “other side” on CQN that they are railing against. No CQN’r on here has been proclaiming the superiority of any other ethnic or religious group. No one has been expressing nostalgia for a time when there was lots more miscegenation going on.
I just want basic humanitarian principles to thrive. Don’t judge people by the colour of their skin or their religious preference. Make distinctions between our avowed enemies and those who merely share characteristics with them. Generalisation, demonisation and stereotyping leads us to believe that all Irish people are potential terrorists, all Muslims are in Al-Qaeda, and all Israelis are murdering Zionists.
We really do deserve a better analysis than that.
Good Night!
the comfortable collective
23:02 on 17 July, 2014
~~~~~~~~
Who Can Forget…
That You Are Responsible For The Most Disgusting Post…..
Ever Seen On These Pages……
When You Referred To Our Afghan War Veterans……
Carrying The Flag At The Opening Ceremony For The London Olympics…
As ‘Beret-Wearing Afghan Child-Killers’..
You Seem To Forget The 9/11 Treachery……
Which Killed A Greater Number Of MY Fellow Britons……
Than Any Single Terrorist Attack Since WWII..
And The Taliban Then Refused To Expel Bin-Liners…….
And His Al-Qeda Cohorts…..
Necessitating DIRECT Intervention….
Our Big Mistake Was To Remain In This Benighted Country ……
To ‘Nation Build’
At Great Cost In Blood & Treasure…..
For An Ungrateful And Undeserving…
Barbaric Medieval Cult…….
Which Should Instead Be Quarantined…..
From Our Western Civilization…
There Are Many Other Deprived Societies Around The World……
More Deserving Of Our Aid And Assistance….
[ Too True..! Ed]
In The Words Of Rudyard Kipling….
Referring To Afghanistan….
‘East Is East…..West Is West !’
How Are The Kebabs Selling..?
~~~
Suppose the one good thing is that there are relatively few on to read that.
SFTB
Well said sir.
Deniabhoy
I have no words to express my feelings abou the horror you and your extended family must be going through.
BRTH
Your piece on the wrongly imprisoned made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
CQN is a sad place tonight.
HH
DeniaBhoy
My thought and prayers are with your cousin and your extended family, truly shocking, so sorry to hear this terrible news.
BRTH
Well done – an incredible read. It brought me back to the 80’s and the continuous Irish Post campaigns for justice for the Guildford 4, Birmingham 6, the Maguires and Judith Ward.
I read the Irish Post every week in those days (I still do) and I was well versed in the various cases, but I had forgotten (or possibly didn’t properly appreciate) the heroics of Alistair Logan – a courageous man who went above and beyond the call of duty, simply in the pursuit of justice.
The closed ranks of the stinking, lying & corrupt British establishment – judiciary, police, politicians…the lot of them….. in 1970’s & 80’s Britain was a cancer. They did what they liked and even with the release & pardon for the innocents, true justice has not been served because the many perpetrators of beatings, torture, lies have never been punished.
We should never forget this and excellent analysis & reports like this help to keep it in focus. Thanks.
tully
Seriously tin foil Heid posts on here ?
SFTB
Well said…..100% spot on.
johann
Yeah, Smoke and Mirrors has outed me.
tully57
00:55 on
18 July, 2014
Justice,you cry.
Cancer you cry.
Any chance of justice for the two Aussies murdered in Belgium?
Just one example below.
Lots more if you wish.But then you know that.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3j1T1dcWKAk
Denia….
So sorry for your loss…..
Deniabhoy
So sorry to hear of your loss.
Prayers for Edel,rip
They are not fair haired blue eyed white middle class westerners so they don’t count
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2695793/Tragic-moments-four-Palestinian-boys-family-playing-Gaza-beach-Israeli-shell-wiped-out.html
macanbheatha Oscar Abú
01:51 on
18 July, 2014
I honestly think that the global tide of public opinion is moving against the degree of force which Israel is deploying in what are unquestionably it`s own legitimate self defence.
These steps,imho, are far beyond what could be considered reasonable and are not commensurate with the threat posed.
The U.S. media ,in general, is extremely unlikely to support this position.
I suspect that the Jewish lobby is too powerful.
Financially and politically.
Israeli commandos on the beach in Gaza ,followed by tanks.
Was that the reason for the beach being shelled?
Why do players get involved, they are on a hiding to nothing?
http://talkingbaws.com/2014/07/17/celtic-fans-react-angrily-as-nir-biton-wades-into-israel-palestine-issue-on-social-media/
deniabhoy
22:39 on 17 July, 2014
Just took a call from my mum back in Troon to tell me my cousin was on the plane shot down. Edel was born and raised on Palmerstown, Dublin before moving to Oz where she raised her own family. She had just been back in Dublin to visit her aging mother and was heading home via Amaterdam and Kuala Lumpur. Her kids will never see their mum again – numb just thinking about it.
Tonight thoughts and prayers for all of her family in Perth and the Byrne family back in Dublin.
Condolences to you and your family laddie.
May the souls of all the faithful departed rest in peace
DENIABHOY
Condolences to you and yours,mate.
More victims of naked self-interest. What a world.