PSG AND INTER BOTH HAVE LISBON LIONS ON THEIR MIND AHEAD OF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE FINAL
- BY LIAM CARRIGAN
- 4 days ago
- 3 min read
The final game of this season’s European Football calendar takes place this Saturday, and for different reasons, both teams will have the Lisbon Lions on their minds.
For Inter Milan, Celtic’s 1967 win is a very personal reminder of the power of the underdog.
Inter won the European Cup, as it was called then, in 1964 and 1965.
So, when they faced off against Celtic two years later, very few people outside Glasgow gave The Hoops a chance.
When Inter went a goal up early on, the result seemed a formality. But Celtic had other ideas. The rest, as they say, is history.
That 2-1 victory in Lisbon remains Celtic’s greatest achievement in our long, proud, unbroken history. For Inter however, it was the beginning of a marked decline. After losing to Celtic, they didn’t win the big Cup again until 2009.
For Inter, The Lisbon Lions Offer Hope. To PSG, They are a Benchmark That No-one has Yet Matched
Inter’s opponents this Saturday, Paris Saint Germain, didn’t even exist when The Lisbon Lions brought the European Cup back to Paradise.
Despite their current standing as one of the world’s richest football clubs, they weren’t actually formed until 1970. Back then, the big team in Paris was Racing Club.
Unfortunately, they “did a Rangers” back in the late 1980s, and ceased to be. A new club currently plays in their stead under the name Racing Club De France.
Anyway, I digress.
PSG have won all three domestic trophies in France this season. This means that on Saturday they could, potentially, become the first team since Celtic to win The European Cup and all major domestic competitions they entered in a single season.
Celtic remain the only football club in European history to have achieved this feat thus far.
It’s a cruel twist of footballing irony that Inter, who stand alongside Real Madrid as one of the first truly dominant European football superpowers go into Saturday’s match as heavy underdogs.
They face a PSG side awash with star names and backed by the almost unparalleled wealth of the nation of Qatar.
I’m sure quite a few Inter fans, especially those old enough to have been around in 1967 will look at Celtic and think “If the Lisbon Lions could do it, so can we.”
On the other hand, PSG and their supporters, whom I have a lot of time for owing to the solidarity they showed with Celtic’s own supporters over the recent “Show Israel the Red Card” Campaign, will look at the Lisbon Lions and also, for entirely different reasons think “If Celtic can do it, so can we.”
Whoever wins on Saturday, it’s comforting to think that, whatever history is written in the aftermath of the game, Celtic will be on the minds of those who write it.
Personally, I like to see new teams winning the big Cup, so, I’ll probably be rooting for PSG.
However, if they do bring home the Champions League, and complete a historic quadruple, never let anyone forget:
Celtic did it first, and we didn't need billions in oil money to do it. We did it with eleven working class men from the West of Scotland.
