Rapid to Taunt Celtic/ Falkirk CIS Cup Game Team News

By: Matt | September 23rd, 2009

The thing that came on the mind of most Celtic supporters when Rapid Vienna was assigned to the same Europa League group was “revenge.” Even most supporters who were not born in 1984, know the story of the Cup Winner Cup match against Rapid and wanted some swift and harsh revenge for the Vienna’s antics and subsequent replay at Old Trafford. If you don’t know the story, the quick version is Celtic and Rapid met in a European Cup Winner’s Cup tie in 1984 where Celtic got a lost 3-1 in Vienna, but won 3-0 in the match at Parkhead, however a Rapid Vienna player feigned an injury by pretending to be hit with a bottle thrown from the stand. UEFA replayed the match at Old Trafford where Rapid Vienna won 1-0. Celtic supporters in Manchester were so mad at the acting, cheating Austrians that some came onto the pitch and attacked the Rapid players, with one fan connecting a square kick to one Rapid Vienna player’s… *ahem* “marbles” or “change purse” or whatever you want to call that area. Needless to say, many Celtic fans still froth with anger when the name Rapid Vienna is mentioned. Not content in pissing Celtic fans off enough by their presence, Rapid now want Celtic fans to think they are seeing the 1984 Rapid Vienna team, since the Austrians will wear the red colored kits to commemorate the notorious 1984 European Cup-Winners’ Cup tie between the sides. Rapid spokesman Sharif Shoukry said: “We wanted to keep this secret, but yes, we are definitely going to play in red. Our away strip for the Austrian league already shows red and blue but for the Europa League and the special game in Glasgow, one of the reasons we chose red was to remember 1984. It has helped us once and so why shouldn’t it help us again? We have a sense of humour and certainly don’t want this to be viewed badly in Scotland. We had other options knocked back by Uefa so we thought it would be good to wear the all-red strip for the first time since the game in Manchester – but it’s not aimed at upsetting Celtic.” Somehow, I don’t think Celtic fans will see the humor.

In less angered inducing and more current news, for today’s match against Falkirk in the CIS cup, it seems Tony Mowbray has decided to find a middle ground about my question yesterday whether or not the CIS Cup mattered. Georgios Samaras is still recovering from going into the bench in the Hapoel Tel-Aviv game, so Chris Killen and Scott McDonald are likely to be paired up again today in the striker position. It is also believed that ToMo will rest some starters like Scott Brown, Shaun Maloney, and Andreas Hinkel, meaning possible starts for Paddy McCourt, Niall McGinn, and Paul Caddis.