Nicholson's Silent Response: Celtic's CEO on the Ibrox Incident

Eleven days on from Celtic’s visit to Ibrox there hasn’t been a single word attributed to Michael Nicholson about the events.

In over three years as CEO Nicholson has made only one media appearance, introducing Brendan Rodgers as manager in June 2023 where he memorably claimed that the ambition of the club was to be world class in everything that they do. It will be a very short list to cover the areas that Celtic are world class in.

Late on in the match at Ibrox, Arne Engels was struck in the head by a coin, for Nicholson and his cronies on the board the clubs biggest asset came very close to what would have been a very serious eye injury, possibly career ending.

An insurance pay-out wouldn’t have begun to compensate a 21-year-old internationalist setting out in his career.

Nicholson watched from the Directors Box, Engels was able to finish the game but that is neither here nor there.

Almost a fortnight on not a word has been said by the SPFL, SFA, or either club. It seems that their joint commitment to the toxic O** F*** brand comes ahead of everything, even a duty of care to employees.

Sky Sports captured the moment that Engels was struck and fell to the ground, referee Don Robertson picked up a coin, ran across the pitch to an unknown official and that is effectively the end of the matter.

The two clubs briefed favoured media partners, in Celtic’s case the Daily Record, about their shock and horror over the incident, a box ticking exercise with nothing heard of since.

Someone on Twitter did highlight a likely suspect seen making a throwing action just before Engels was struck but no-one in football seems interested.

A competent CCTV system should be able to narrow things down but so far we have been spared a mug shot of someone to assist Police Scotland with their inquires.

Three sets of fixtures have been played since the January 2 fixture, the Glasgow Derby is becoming less significant with each passing day and in time honoured tradition it seems that everyone would just like to move on for the good of Scottish football. Nicholson certainly doesn’t want to draw attention to an unsavoury aspect of the brand that the Celtic board has invested deeply into since July 2012.

This should be an easy arrest for Scotland’s finest….Up 3-0, thumping their biggest rivals and this is how the behave!!!!Scumbags
— 🇯🇵🇮🇪🇮🇪 ☘☘ Charlie Tully. ☘☘ 🇮🇪🇮🇪🇯🇵 (@TullyParadise) January 3, 2025

Without doubt Celtic have their fair share of nutters. Coins, lighters and vapes have been thrown at opposing players at Celtic Park, it is an issue that the club is hopefully tackling with strong sanctions for anyone involved.

At Ibrox the issue is more widespread with little sign of interest in eradicating it from the host club. Why go alienating a sizeable chunk of your support, many of whom cheered and celebrated seeing an opponent fall to the ground.

The familiar, triumphalist songs were soon belting out with gusto as their miserable lives were given a couple of days reprieve.

At every big match at Ibrox it is almost impossible to see the passageways in the three stands visible to television cameras.

Everyone inside Ibrox on January 2 should be known to the host club, every seat was filled by a Season Ticket holder, My Gers member or a corporate guest.

If they can’t identify who threw the coin at Engels the club becomes the problem rather than the fan that decided to celebrate victory by trying to blind an opponent.

Ibrox has become such a dangerous place that Celtic stopped accepting tickets to provide 800 fans as target practise.

Back in April 2017 a fan wandered out of the Sandy Jardine Stand to confront Scott Brown, a full sized battery was launched at celebrating Celtic players, after scoring racist gestures were made at Scott Sinclair.

Fast forward five years and a Celtic physio was left permanently disfigured by a bottle thrown by a corporate guest.

At the same match there was the mystery of the half time broken glass which appeared in Joe Hart’s penalty area.

CCTV seemed to be switched off while the Ibrox ground-staff repaired the penalty box, none of the Police or Stewards seemed to notice or, there was no gasp from the fans at ‘a bottle being thrown’ onto the pitch.

As ever Nicholson took no action, it was only seven months later at the Celtic AGM that he was questioned on the incident. Reluctantly answering.

So over the less than three years broken glass has mysteriously appeared over half-time in the Celtic penalty area and an £11m asset/player struck in the face by a coin. A physio disfigured.

As Nicholson and the others at Celtic rub their hands over the March 15 Derby fixture it seems that they are quite prepared to put up with serious incidents involving employees when visiting Ibrox. It seems that the O** F*** brand is too precious to challenged.

Is it going to take an even more serious incident before the Celtic CEO finds his voice and disassociates from his intended Sydney Super Cup partners?

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