1955-03-19: Celtic 1-0 Motherwell, League Division A

Match Pictures | Matches: 19541955 | 1954-55 pictures

Trivia

  • A wholesale restructuring of the forward line. Fernie was out unfit to play and Mochan was brought in as the new player but this entailed wholesale juggling with Fallon the only person that 'stayed put'. Collins moved to the right wing, Walsh moved in one to inside right (where he was clearly more effective than out on the wing), and Mochan played inside Tully (who was moved over to his more usual left hand side) rather than Tully inside of Mochan. This smacked of all the tinkerings of a Kelly placement in the face of going for a title. After the embarrassing draw against Partick Thistle clearly something needed to be done to rejig the forward line but the obvious move failed to be addressed – that of replacing Fallon at centre forward.
  • Bobby Evans and Bobby Collins played for the Scotland League team that defeated the England League team 3-2 at Hampden on the 16th March. Evans was captain and Collins scored one of the goals.
  • John Higgins season was over and he required a cartilage operation and would be out till July.

Review

Another dullish game whiuch started brightly for celtic with Collins going close at the start. Stein required attention early for a head knock. fallon had a chance with a run in on goal but was beaten to the ball and the danger cleared. Mochan was also playing well with shots on target. The first hal;f ended goalleass and there was little to think that anything would change in the order of play at the start of the second half. However seven minutes into the half Mochan collected the ball and hit a classic Mochan unstoppable shot that flew into the net. Fallon had picked up a leg knock and moved out to the right wing. Celtic managed to avoid an equaliser through a scramble in front of Bonnar's goal with Meechan forced to clear off the line. There was a shout for a penaly for Celtic in the closing stages when Mochan was swept off his feet but the referee wasn't interested.
A dull game, but a win – in fact Jaymak in the Evening Times described it as 'boringly inept'.

Another interesting weekend of games which finally confirmed that the title race was between Aberdeen and Celtic, though Hearts with games in hand were still potentially in there. Aberdeen beat Falkirk 2-1 away. Rangers lost to Raith Rovers 1-0. Hearts and St Mirren drew and Clyde lost. With 5 games left to play the table stood thus:-

Team P W L D F A Pts
Aberdeen 25 20 4 1 60 21 41
Celtic 25 15 2 8 65 31 38
Rangers 25 15 7 3 59 27 33
Hearts 21 13 4 4 60 31 30
St Mirren 25 11 7 7 49 42 29
Clyde 26 10 7 9 56 44 29

Teams

Celtic:
Bonnar; Haughney, Meechan; Evans, Stein, Peacock; Collins, Walsh, Fallon, Mochan, Tully.
Scorers: Mochan (52)

Motherwell:
McIntyre; Kilmarnock, Shaw; Mason, Paton, Redpath; Hunter, Aitken, McSeveney, Humphries, Williams.
Scorers:

Referee: J A Bissett (Edinburgh)
Attendance: 35,000

Articles

  • Match Report (see end of page below)

Pictures

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