Celtic and Racing’s Decider Became the Battle of Montevideo

Bertie Auld was ordered off in Montevideo, but stayed on the pitch. By then, Celtic and Racing Club’s third meeting for the 1967 Intercontinental Cup had become a succession of confrontations, dismissal decisions and police intervention. Racing won 1–0 through Juan Carlos Cárdenas. Yet the decisive goal had to compete for attention with a match in which even an instruction to leave the field could go unfulfilled.

The teams had come to Uruguay in early November because neither had settled the contest at home. Celtic, the European champions, won 1–0 at Hampden Park in Glasgow through captain Billy McNeill. Racing, the South American champions, answered with a 2–1 victory in Buenos Aires. The competition counted results rather than aggregate goals: one victory apiece meant a neutral play-off at the Estadio Centenario in Montevideo.

The trouble had begun well before the decider. Recalling the Glasgow match for Nutmeg magazine, Celtic defender John Clark said manager Jock Stein had warned his players about the aggression they could expect: “They’ll knock you down, shove you, slap you.” Jimmy Johnstone became a repeated target of fouls. One challenge early in the second half prompted a mass confrontation and brought Stein onto the pitch in protest. “That wee man was just like a ball to them,” Clark recalled.

In Buenos Aires, Celtic goalkeeper Ronnie Simpson was struck by an object thrown from the crowd before kick-off. He suffered a bleeding head wound and was replaced. Racing’s victory meant another match, but Celtic chairman Bob Kelly wanted to stop. Auld later recalled Kelly entering the dressing room and telling Stein: “Look, if they want it that much, just let them have it. We’re not playing a third match against them.” Stein nevertheless went ahead with the decider.

In Montevideo, the dismissal decisions did not produce a straightforward count of departures. A later account drawing on Clarín and The Guardian lists five players who left: Racing’s Alfio Basile and Juan Carlos Rulli, and Celtic’s Bobby Lennox, Jimmy Johnstone and John Hughes. Auld was also ordered off, but refused to go. That distinction explains why some accounts describe six dismissal decisions without meaning that six players left the field.

Police entered the disorder. When Stein tried to send Lennox back onto the pitch after his dismissal, a sword-carrying policeman stopped the attempt. Celtic’s own retaliation was unmistakable: Hughes attacked the Racing goalkeeper, while Tommy Gemmell kicked an opponent from behind. Stein later recalled being so angry at Gemmell that he crossed the pitch to confront him.

Cárdenas’s only goal gave Racing the cup. For Celtic, the consequences continued after the match. BBC1 broadcast highlights two days later, bringing the confrontations before a wider audience. The Celtic board fined every player £250. Auld’s later recollection held onto the disappointment that preceded the violence: “We’d been looking forward to playing the champions of Argentina so much.” The deciding match had ended without the trophy and with a financial penalty imposed by Celtic’s own board.