Hoopy, Chips and Musical Chairs - A boys first Celtic Match

Taking someone to their first football match is a big moment in their life, taking your son to his first Celtic Match is a massive moment in both of your lives. I had debated with myself for a few months as to when was the right age to take my son to his first Celtic match, he is pre-school age so part of me felt he was too young to understand but another part of me knew he was old enough to actually enjoy the occasion. I figured that (a) it was only 90 minutes and (b) if he didn’t like it we could leave at half time or after an hour. I knew the game for me would be written off and I wouldn’t be able to absorb it as I usually do but it would be worth it to share the experience with him so I chose the Motherwell match and swapped my own seat for one in the “family section” and bought a concession ticket at £17.

In the days leading up to the match my own memories of going to the football at an early age came flooding back. My first experience of football was not at Parkhead but a few miles down the road at Shawfield as my Dad was a Clyde supporter and in 1977 / 78 they were in the old division 2 when he started taking me and my brother. My recollections of going are quite clear even though I was only 4 or 5 at the time, I remember that shawfield even then was pretty run down; I remembered being lifted over the turnstile; I remembered the smell of smoke and beer filled the terracings. This was pre-alcohol ban and I recall my dad taking a carrier bag with six tins of beer in it, crisps for us kids and his radio which he had on in the background to listen to the scores in the other matches. I wouldn’t actually watch any of the match, we played on the empty terracing behind the goal, running up and down the stairs, only returning at half time for the obligatory pie and bovril. The one vivid memory from my early years of watching live football was the shock of seeing the fantastic bright green pitch, it was so much more vivid than you saw on the grainy TV pictures of the day and brought the experience to life.

With this still fresh in my mind I wondered if my son would bank his memories of his first match the way I had and retrieve them later on in life. I haven’t force fed him Celtic in an attempt to get him enthused in it at an early age I want him to discover the same joy and passion that I have, gradually in his own time. He has watched me leave for games in my Celtic scarf and has sat beside me and watched televised matches so has picked up on a few of the identifiable symbols of Celtic. For a boy his age the things he identifies and looks for is the green and white hoops; Georgious Samaras due to his long flowing locks; Hoopy and a few of the songs which he has grown to like. By the wonders of you tube he dances along to “a grand old team to play for”, “let the people sing” and “just can’t get enough” by the Fly Tims as he calls them. When he watches the games on the TV and hears singing coming from the terracing he stands with his ear pressed against the screen to hear if it’s a song he recognises. These things have all triggered an interest and curiosity in him to start asking to go with me to a game.

We set off for the match armed with enough sweets to last a home and away tie with extra time and penalties, for those moments of wandering boredom and I had promised him chips at half time as an additional incentive. On the way he pointed out other people with Celtic scarfs on and I could sense him holding on to my hand tighter as the streets started to crowd up. I took his picture with the backdrop of the stadium and a kind lady put down her chips to go behind the lens and picture us both together. If he wasn’t going to remember this I was going to collate the evidence for him to look back on in future years; Match Ticket; Match Programme and Photographs.

I had timed it so that we didn’t arrive in too early and as we entered the stadium I took him a walk along the concourse underneath to kill some time. It was to be a masterstroke as we stumbled upon one of his favourite Celtic Symbols – Hoopy. As it was the family section Hoopy had turned up in the concourse and was meeting the children; now I have to be honest and I know I am an adult but I never understood the attraction of hoopy, he has no back story, no depth of character he just comes on the pitch walks the line and waves. Fair play to Hoopy though the kids seem to really connect to him as a character and my son immediately latched on to him and so I was able to bag another souvenir for the day – a picture of him with hoopy. I think if I had taken him home at that point he would have been happy; however I underestimated his understanding as he immediately asked where the pitch was.

I carried him as we walked up the short flight of stairs and as we reached the landing at the top, the bright green of the pitch came into full view and even above the din of noise I heard a gasp and his back straightened with a surge of energy usually only reserved for birthdays and Christmas. It was the reaction I had hoped he would display because it was the way I had responded all those years before. We took our seats and he was transfixed with the colour and noise of the green brigade and the roar as Celtic went into the huddle before the match. Just as the match kicked off a man mountain came into the row in front and sat directly in his line of vision, so we uprooted and moved along the row to two spare seats which offered him a better view.

My decision to take him to the designated family section as opposed to my own seat was so that we avoided some of the more colourful language at tense moments in the match. This would prove not to be a sound assumption as a group of about 6 guys appeared 10 minutes into the match full of high spirits (Smirnoff / White & Mckay) and sat in various seats surrounding us. This being the family section I can only assume they were the McSweary brothers as the profanities being shouted were of an extremely high calibre and incredibly imaginative however I soon had this fear of my son asking his mum later what a “Rape Fu@k dog” was. Now I don’t have an issue with guys swearing at matches and in front of my son as I would view it more as my choice to take him into that environment but I felt the family section would have offered us some buffer against it. It was so incessant that I was eying up our next move for the second half and spotted a few rows of empty seats before the cordon with the away fans.

The game itself wasn’t entirely the most captivating of spectacle but it was doing enough to keep his attention through to the 40 minute mark when I decided to venture down for the much promised chips. There were only about twenty people in front of us in the queue but we still managed to miss the start of the second half and not being a regular of the kiosks at Celtic Park I was unaware that the club had recruited the losing contestants from this years Junior Apprentice and put them into running the concessions. This was also obviously their first day on the job.    

Chips in hand we took our third different set of seats of the day giving us an immediate welcome relief to the ears and the seat provided an amazing view of the towering size of the north stand which was soon to be on its feet when Hooper slotted home the only goal of the game. We celebrated together seeing his first live goal and quickly soon after we joined in the huddle,  breaking away from it half way through to let him watch and take in the sight of it all round the stadium. The whole experience was like watching your all time favourite movie with someone who hasn’t seen it before and willing them to love it as much as you do and you glance at their faces at the bits you hope they get. He seemed to get it and whilst he wasn’t always focussed on the game there were enough new experiences for him to enjoy and he never once asked if it was time to go home. I took that decision for him on the 85^th minute to give us a head start and as we were five minutes into our walk he asked if he could go again? When I told him of course - he asked if we could go back tomorrow!

I know that he will want to return again, this was the start of his journey into the world of supporting Celtic, for now the next few years losses will not be met with disappointment, Victories will not be met with euphoria, instead he will go from a last minute defeat / victory to hopping on his scooter without any further analysis. There will come a day when he starts the bargaining process of asking at what age he can go to the game himself with his mates just as I did when I wanted to go to the jungle and then god sparing us he will probably return to going with his dad again when we are much older.    

His first visit to Celtic Park was a success, it had gone so much better than I had hoped and I hadn’t in anyway deterred him by taking him too soon. Listening to him re-telling the story of his day to family later on I realised that he had taken in what it was all about and as he settled down to flick through his match programme he was further delighted to find out there was a picture in it of the Fly Tims.