Shakhter Karagandy boss Viktor Kumykov plans to continue the Kazakh club's sheep-sacrificing ritual ahead of their Champions League play-off second-leg tie against Celtic at Parkhead.
Shakhter Karagandy boss Viktor Kumykov plans to continue the Kazakh club's sheep-sacrificing ritual ahead of their Champions League play-off second-leg tie against Celtic at Parkhead.
The Kazakh champions caused a stir when they killed a sheep at the Astana Arena the day before last Tuesday night's 2-0 first-leg win over the Hoops.
Animal rights group PETA expressed their outrage in a strongly-worded letter to UEFA president urging Michel Platini to punish Shakhter.
Kumykov's pre-match press conference at Celtic Park on Tuesday afternoon took a surreal turn when the subject was broached.
Speaking through an interpreter, the Russian said: "All I can say is that every team and every club has its own pre-match traditions and rituals.
"Celtic must have their own. We will try to respect our traditions and those traditions have been in place even before we came to the club."
Asked if the ritual would take place, he replied: "Possibly, yes."
Then, when asked where he planned to get the sheep, Kumykov, to laughter, replied: "As far as we know in Scotland the agriculture is very developed so it shouldn't be an issue to find a sheep."
The Shakhter boss, though, played down the effects the pre-match ritual had had on the first game in Kazakhstan.
He said: "Of course this tradition may have certain psychological impact on players that can help them to relax before the game.
"But obviously, what really matters is on the football pitch, the game and the final score and you know we scored twice in the first-leg and Celtic failed to score, that's what really matters."
Animal protection charity OneKind has voiced its disgust over the pre-match plan to sacrifice a sheep.
OneKind's chief executive, John Brady said: "The arrogance of the Kazakhstan side is really quite staggering if they think they can continue with their bizarre and unnecessary rituals while in a country known to be a nation of animal lovers.
"It is quite clear there will be a backlash from this horrific practice, which has nothing whatsoever to do with football or sport.
"Surely it's not too much to ask for the visiting side to be respectful of people's views and feelings, not to mention strict laws on animal slaughter, while they are playing on our soil."
In purely footballing matters, Shakhter are on the cusp of becoming the first club from Kazakhstan to qualify for the group stages of the Champions League, although a place in the group stages of the Europa League is guaranteed.
Kumykov, though, tried to play down the pressure of taking the final step to join Europe's elite.
"There is an additional pressure on my shoulders, I feel that but it doesn't have to be Champions League," he said.
"It won't be a tragedy for us if we don't qualify to the Champions League group stages.
"As we stated before, the main task was to qualify for the group stage of a European competition and we have achieved this anyway.
"It may be even better if we don't qualify for the Champions League group stages because in football it is always better when you develop gradually."
Shakhter captain Andrei Finonchenko, who scored the opener in the first game, accepts the visitors will probably have to weather an early storm in the east end of Glasgow.
"We need to perform at our best possible level because Celtic lost the first leg and will go out very hard from the start of this game," he said.
"We will need to be careful in defence and try not to concede in the first few minutes.
"Our players have played in many countries with many teams and of course there will be a full house at Celtic Park which will give an additional support to Celtic, but we have to forget about that and focus on our game and try to achieve a positive result."
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