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Manchester United: Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss

by Christopher McIntosh
09/23/2006

Glory, glory, Man U-NI-ted.

Glory, glory, Man U-NI-ted.

Unbelievably, one of the most important, well-respected, and richest clubs in the world did not make it out of their group into the quarterfinals of last year's European championships.

They performed so poorly they didn't even get into the UEFA cup, which is basically the European equivalent of the NIT.

Not good times.

There were injury problems and infighting and players out of position, but in both the Premiership and the Champions League, they just didn't get it done.

This year, things are looking up.

Four games played in the Premiership.

Four wins.

Today they opened up their Champions League campaign for 2006 hoping to keep the form that has them at the top of the English table.

Oddly enough, they drew Celtic football club.

The obvious reason this is strange is that Celtic is from Glasgow (Scotland for those of you scoring at home) and Manchester is from, well, England.

Man U's manager is Scottish. And quite proud of the fact.

The Tartan Army do not like the English. They have two teams they root for.

Scotland.

And whoever's playing England.

As you might have heard, the Scots and the English have had a few historical differences - differences that go back a few years. The problem is that they haven't quite gotten over them. Scotland is still a relatively weak footballing nation and has almost never (recently) enjoyed the kind of success that the English teams have had.

Oh yeah, and there is that Old Firm thing.

Celtic and Rangers are the two major teams out of Glasgow.

Quick, name another city in Scotland.

Yeah, I failed too. (Actually, I got Aberdeen, but only because their football team is called Hearts - which may be the least intimidating name since the Kansas City Wiz, or the Stanford Cardinal and their inexplicable tree mascot).

As such, they are the only teams with any money in the country and tend to dominate the rest of the league by ten to fifteen points or more.

And they hate each other.

I mean hate.

Not like Raiders fans or Husker fans or Knicks fans.

We're talking wars on the streets if you wear the wrong colors. It's gang violence without the drugs.

This time it's about something much smaller.

Religion.

According to How Soccer Explains The World (a brilliant book every soccer fan should be required to read), Glasgow Celtic football club, a team (seemingly inexplicably) adopted by the Irish as well, was formed by Irish immigrants looking for work around the turn of the century.

Quick, name a football club in Ireland.

Now you have some idea why they've adopted the green and white of Celtic.

Around the great Irish exodus, "rich" immigrants went to the US looking for work. Many of the rest went to Glasgow.

Scots and the Irish. England and the Scots. Pot, meet Kettle. Kettle, meet pot.

Scotland - predominantly Prots. Celtic (Irish) - predominantly Catholic.

You do the math. Rangers - the other football club worth a damn in Scotland - was virulently Protestant. Up until around the time of Jackie Robinson, Rangers would not hire or play Catholics in their club. Anywhere. No janitors, no secretaries, no players.

So. There's a little bit of history here.

Scottish (by way of Glasgow) manager heading the (currently) leading club in England against the Irish supported Glasgow club known as Celtic.

Second strange fact about this game. Despite the fact that both clubs have been around for scores of decades, they have never met in any competition.

No Champions League, no UEFA Cup, no Cup-Winner's Cup.

Nada.

Coming in, it's already a hyped match.

And boy did they live up to it.

Wayne Rooney was back from a three game suspension, as was Paul Scholes (another instrumental cog in the Man U machine injured almost the entirety of last year, and Irish by birth).

If I had bet anyone on the British Isles that Celtic would score two goals on the road, they would have laughed at me.

If I had bet anyone on those Isles that Celtic would have scored those two goals in the first half, they would have gladly taken my money and given me 100-1 odds (the Brits will bet on anything).

If I had bet that Celtic would score two goals in the first half and lose, I'd be a gazillionaire (term of art).

And that's exactly what happened.

Celtic decided to follow Rooney around like he was some sort of criminal poised to rob a bank. A phalanx of Celtic players followed him around the pitch. It worked, but Man U did something radical.

They played with two strikers. (Sarcasm alert for those of you new to the game).

Let's just say the other striker had a bit of a good game.

Two goals in the first half and he should have had three.

At one point he had eight of Man U's thirteen shots on goal.

2-2 at half time.

Celtic scored on a goal where Rio Ferdinand (great center back, rich, but incredibly stupid - to wit, he missed out on eight months of European play because he refused to take a drug test) basically fell asleep and let a Celtic player whose size was only exceeded by his name - muscle past him and finish in fine fashion.

They also scored on a free kick so well taken that Man U's goalkeeper didn't even move.

Naturally, the scorer was Japanese.

Of course. Makes perfect sense.

The second half was a bit of a downer. Man U scored in the first five minutes and everyone pretty much knew it was now just a question of how many goals Celtic was going to lose by or how many players Wayne Rooney was going to maim.

All in all, a good start to the Champions League for Manchester (expletive) United.

Unless your Irish, from Glasgow, or Scottish.

Sorry.

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