Celtic captain Scott Brown delivers one last Joey Barton putdown

By John McGinley

May 13, 2021

Celtic captain Scott Brown has been asked about his infamous confrontation with Joey Barton during the 2016/17 season.

Barton arrived in Scotland with a large amount of hype behind him, talking himself up as Rangers’ saviour to stop Brendan Rodgers.

He was humiliated on the pitch of course and completely shown up by Brown, who would go on to enjoy an invincible treble campaign.

Brown was asked about it all by Sky Sports today, saying: “He talked a great game, I showed him a great game. It’s as simple as that. He done the talking off the park and I done it on the field.

“I had the opportunity, at the end he came and shook my hand, it was a battle and it was already in my head I was winning this battle before the game even started because he was talking too much. He maybe done that a lot down in England.

“He’s had a fantastic career. He went back down to the English Premier League for a couple of seasons with Burnley. It showed you what a top-quality side we had at the time, that we were doing that to people who could play in the Premier League.”

Those were good times weren’t they? The days of Senderos and Barton, of Moussa Dembele and Patrick Roberts.

Glory days, indeed.

That’s the level every fan wants Celtic to strive towards next term. It’s unrealistic to expect us to become true Invincibles again, but hopefully, the new manager can at least bring an air of freshness and excitement just like Brendan Rodgers did.

We don’t know who the next Celtic captain will be yet. No doubt though their spell in that role will be defined by similar battles with Rangers counterparts.

If he can bring the fight to them like Broony did, they’re halfway there.

In other news, Moussa Dembele sends a class message to Scott Brown.