Photo: The new look socially distant Celtic Huddle before Ross County game

By John McGinley

July 26, 2020

The famous and iconic Celtic Huddle has a new look this season due to the ongoing pandemic.

The official club Twitter account has published a photo of the pre-match ritual at today’s match against Ross County, which now presumably complies with social distancing guidelines.

As we discussed earlier this month, Scotland’s National Clinical Director Jason Leitch has sent out a pre-season warning to players, advising them not to congregate in large groups unnecessarily, including for goal celebrations and huddles.

Speaking to BBC football show Off The Ball on July 18th, he said: “There are two things here; there is the safety of the 23 people on the grass which is crucial.

“We don’t want big goal celebrations, no big huddles or folk falling on the floor.

“We also don’t want people pretending to have a broken leg so that we put other people at risk coming on to help them with their pretend broken leg.

“So there are behaviours on the pitch but there is also the influence that behaviour will have on the amateur game and the kids who are playing at the weekends now and all of that.”

We won’t be getting a look at the normal huddle for quite a while then, though it won’t stop team leaders like Scott Brown firing up the starting eleven prior to competitive games.

The famous Celtic huddle / (Photo by George Wood/Getty Images)

When fans are allowed back into Paradise hopefully the moment is just as rousing as it has been down the years.

Recently celebrating its 25th anniversary, the Huddle is a matchday staple that can’t be allowed to go away!

In other news, Celtic were forced to broadcast today’s match live on YouTube after technical problems with the new virtual season ticket platform.