With an eye on Celtic Park for the 21st of March, Nicola Sturgeon has branded Rangers’ title celebrations “disgraceful and selfish” [BBC].
Yesterday, we shared the First Minister’s concerns over the upcoming Glasgow Derby. Sturgeon’s rhetoric has ramped up, unequivocally blasting our rival fans. Shocking scenes on Sunday saw Gers supporters destroying public property and congregating in their thousands.
While Celtic fans have protested in recent history, that was incomparable with the sights of Sunday evening. George Square, Ibrox and other parts of Glasgow were greeted with thousands of Rangers fans. That was in direct contravention of Covid-19 protocol, and the First Minister has made her anger very clear.
Nicola Sturgeon said [BBC]:
“The behaviour witnessed at the weekend was disgraceful and selfish.
“At no point did Rangers simply and unequivocally say to their fans ‘stay at home’. Or, when they were gathered, say ‘go home’.”
Rangers’ pitiful response shows Nicola Sturgeon has valid concerns over Celtic Park clash
What a dismal situation we find ourselves in.
Additionally, Rangers’ response to events was irresponsible at best. Their chairman Douglas Park said he was [Glasgow Live]:
“…at a loss as to what more Rangers Football Club could have done to limit the reaction to winning our historic 55th [citation needed] league title”.
“It is particularly disappointing that there has been a lack of acknowledgement from the Scottish government to the wide range of efforts we undertook to limit public safety issues.
Moreover, Park added:
“It is also particularly disappointing that Mr Swinney has chosen to lambast Rangers publicly, given the fact that we had proactively initiated engagement with Police Scotland, the SPFL, the Scottish government as well as a local MP.”
Those “wide range of efforts” clearly didn’t include encouraging Rangers supporters not to congregate en masse. It’s like apologising after an empty that’s gone awry: it feels hollow, and the point is you had the party anyway.
Given Rangers’ proclivity to avoid social responsibility [BBC], it hardly seems surprising that this happened. Unavoidably, it puts the spotlight on Celtic in a significant way. The Bhoys host Rangers at Celtic Park on the 21st of March. Similar scenes could see Glasgow kept in Tier 4 for even longer.
For those of us who haven’t been able to see our families in a long time, or even want a modicum of normality, that’s a particularly disappointing prospect.
READ MORE: There’s a vacancy that should be of interest to a prominent Celtic figure.
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