THE last time Celtic won four titles in a row, the acclaim for Jock Stein's side in this country was almost drowned out by sneering from south of the border.
The English media took one look at Celtic securing a fourth successive Scottish League in 1968-69, slated the achievement as "too easy" and claimed that a weak league produced weak champions.
Stein hit back, not only defending his own players, but the whole of Scottish football. And just 12 months later, would be proved correct about the merits of the Scottish League, when Celtic defeated the English champions, Leeds United, in the European Cup semi-final in April 1970.
However, in April 1969, his side were putting the finishing touches to his second Treble as a manager, something only Martin O'Neill has delivered for Celtic since. In the space of a five days, Stein's side won the league at Rugby Park on Monday April 21 and then defeated Rangers 4-0 in the Scottish Cup final to add to the League Cup, lifted after beating Hibernian 6-2 in a final which was also held over until April 5.
The fact that Dunfermline finished third in 1968-69 might have added to the English downgrading of Stein's success, but that was the same season the Fife club reached the last four of Europe, as did second-placed Rangers.
Stein's fourth title had a bigger winning margin than the previous three. Celtic were five points ahead of their Glasgow rivals, but Stein insisted the success was much harder on the pitch than it may have seemed on paper.
"I don't think it was any easier," the legendary manager declared 46 years ago in Celtic's own book. "It was a better league, all-round. A harder one. No team went undefeated all season, or even looked like it, and that is a healthy sign.
"Our standards (in Scotland) are not as bad as they are made out. Airdrie took five points off the Old Firm and Kilmarnock took four. That shows there is no monopoly in every fixture. The difference is often not in ability, but in atmosphere.
"I know what its like to be manager of a small provincial club, when I was at Dunfermline, and to play in front of small crowds. That's why all teams lift their game when they play Celtic or Rangers but often cannot keep that up.
"You rarely go to an English first division game without seeing big crowds. Our game, suffers from a lack of them."
A hint of envy from Stein about the glamour in England, simply shows that some things never change. All Scottish clubs then were victims of huge peaks and troughs when it came to attendances, veering from lockouts to modest gatherings. Stein's 'Treble' side played in front of 75,000 against AC Milan at Parkhead in the European Cup but just 24,000 when Falkirk came to the east end of Glasgow for one of ten games played in a packed April.
To underline the strength of opposition 46 years ago, Kilmarnock finished fourth and Dundee United fifth. Just two seasons earlier, Killie had also reached the last four in Europe, while Dundee United had beaten Barcelona home and away. Stein's 'Treble' side paraded all three trophies at Parkhead on a sunny Monday night, just two days after beating Rangers in the Scottish Cup final, and the Greenock side won 4-2.
Modern fans might wonder, where were Aberdeen in all of this? Well, the Pittodrie side endured one of their worst campaigns, finishing in 15th out 18 teams, just above the relegation zone. A year later, the Dons would win the Scottish Cup by beating Celtic in the final and would become on of the major challengers to Stein's side in the early 70s.
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.Â
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.Â
That is invaluable.Â
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 hereComments are closed on this article