CELTIC could end up playing their fifth round William Hill Scottish Cup tie at either Parkhead or Easter Road. East Kilbride and Lothian Thistle Hutchinson Vale will battle it out next Wednesday night for the right to host the Scottish champions in a money-spinning tie for either club. Should East Kilbride prevail, their initial preference would be to keep the tie at their 500-capacity K-Park home. With that, however, unlikely to get the go-ahead from the Scottish Football Association on safety grounds, Mark Horner, the East Kilbride chairman, will push for the tie to be switched to Celtic Park to try to maximise their share of the gate receipts.
SFA guidelines state that a tie should be moved to the “nearest suitable stadium” in the event that a club’s home ground is declared unfit for purpose, with Hamilton Academical’s New Douglas Park the closest ground to East Kilbride. With Hamilton out of the cup courtesy of their shock defeat to Annan Athletic last weekend, their stadium will be free on the weekend of February 6 or 7.
East Kilbride, however, could cite precedent in their bid to move the tie to Celtic Park. In 2013 Albion Rovers moved their Scottish Cup tie against Motherwell to Hamilton rather than play it at neighbouring Airdrie, and did the same a year later when they took Rangers to a quarter-final replay. In neither instance did the SFA intervene.
“We have got a meeting [tomorrow] with SFA security and one of the tournament organisers to discuss our options,” Horner told Herald Sport. “We hope that by coming down to K-Park and having a look around they agree to keep the tie at our ground although we concede that is maybe looking a bit unlikely. This is all a bit new to us so hopefully after this meeting everything will become a bit clearer on what we need to do.
“I don’t know what the protocol is about switching the tie to Celtic Park but if we can’t have the game at K-Park then that would be our preferred option. That would probably suit all parties if Celtic were amenable to the switch. But we’ll hopefully have a better idea of what we can do after the SFA have been down to take a look around and given us their input.”
Lothian Thistle, meanwhile, have already conceded they could not host the match at their Saughton Enclosure stadium should they be the ones to make it through. Chairman Tom Allison revealed they have already exploring the possibility of switching the tie to Easter Road, Livingston’s Tony Macaroni Arena, or the Falkirk Stadium.
Allison said: “We can’t possibly play Celtic at Saughton Enclosure – and I’ve had a chat with the SFA’s safety officer – the police wouldn’t allow it. Easter Road is a possibility. Whitehall Welfare played against Celtic there a good few years ago when they were in a similar position.
“We have a good relationship with [Hibs chairman] Rod Petrie and there could be an opportunity there. I would say Easter Road, Livingston and Falkirk would be the three possibilities at this stage.
“There is talk of the game being on television and, with it being Celtic, there is policing and stewarding to consider. All that affects the thinking, but there are certainly a few options open to us. It is something we will look at and have a chat to the relevant parties if we are lucky enough to get through next Wednesday. It would be a nice problem to have!”
The fourth round tie has now taken on added significance as the biggest game in the history of both clubs and the LTHV chairman added: “I feel like I’m living in a different world, a dreamland, and it’s difficult not to get ahead of yourself. It is a wonderful opportunity to play against the Scottish champions; a club that won the European Cup.
"However, that’s the same for East Kilbride, and we will give them a huge amount of respect. We know it will be no easy task to get through that tie.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here