Celtic’s defeat of Barcelona in 2012 in the Champions League was probably the result in the club’s history outside of the 1967 European Cup win.
Neil Lennon’s Celtic faced a Barcelona side littered with talents like Lionel Messi, Andres Iniesta and Xavi as the Hoops boss looked to get one over the team that went on to win the tournament two seasons later.
Celtic recorded a famous 2-1 win after Tony Watt came off the bench to do this:
And that sparked events with the Barcelona team behind the scenes at Celtic Park that Charlie Mulgrew will never forget.
Barcelona stars ‘fighting each other’ after Celtic defeat
Mulgrew was one of the stars of that game as the Celtic defender tells the story of how he tried to get Andres Iniesta’s shirt after the game when he witnessed some of Barcelona’s stars ‘having to be split up’.
Mulgrew told the Undr The Cosh podcast, “The best bit about that is, the game finishes, I go in the changing room, so walking off the pitch, I’ve arranged to swap shirts with Iniesta
“So I walk in and I go, ‘Right, where is he?’ so I don’t see him. So I walk up to the changing room, I open the door and they’re all fighting each other.
“Messi, Valdez, Fabregas are all pushing and grabbing and having to get split up and I stood at the door like, ‘Yes, this is brilliant to see how much it means to them’.
“At that time I was so comfortable, we’d just beat them, I was buzzing, that adrenaline was flying, I was like, ‘Where’s Iniesta?'”.
Andres Iniesta ‘loved’ the Celtic jersey
And when the madness calmed down, Mulgrew got his shirt but also shared how much Iniesta ‘just loved’ the Celtic jersey.
Mulgrew continued, “So I got drug tested. Me, Xavi, [Alexis] Sanchez and Kelvin Wilson, us four got drug tested, I just kept peeing out the door so I wouldn’t miss him, and he came walking by.
“And what was brilliant about it is he wanted a Celtic jersey, so I took his and he asked if he can get a jersey and I just gave him mine.
“Obviously, he would have taken anyone, but he just loved the Celtic jersey. I think they’re well known for having the jersey.”
Neil Lennon labelled Celtic’s win over Barcelona as the best European result in his managerial career and who can deny him that?
Lionel Messi labelled Fraser Forster as ‘not human’ after his heroics helped Celtic pull of that famous victory over the Catalan giants.
That win has created so many memories for Celtic fans but for Mulgrew, who lived and breathed it, it seems the scenes afterwards were one of the best things about the famous result.
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