BERTIE AULD RIP
- Thread starter 50 Shades of Green
- Start date
Spherical Planet
Well-known member
Just a beautiful thing to behold. A man for all seasons and a man for all people.
I can't help but feel sorry for myself, but that's two great men we've lost this year that I never had the privilege to meet in person.
I guess we've all had more than our fair share to cope with these last two years, but Bertie's final act might yet be his greatest gift to Celtic, for if one man can unite the entire Celtic family - then that man could only be Bertie Auld.
Lubos left peg
Well-known member
I'm no crying!! You're crying!!
Steviebhoy67
Well-known member
Wonderful. Tears for an exceptional man
JamSam67
Well-known member
JamSam67
Well-known member
Love the Thai Tim’s Love Reamonn Gormley in tears fur Bertie.
Celtic a club like no other
HH
Shadow2
Well-known member
As a player he was a top class talent and will forever be a true Celtic legend but more importantly imo he was a top class human being, whether he was telling funny stories about his playing days in interviews, belting out Celtic songs at supporter's do's or taking time out to chat and have his photos taken with the fans he never failed to bring a smile to people's faces....ano it's a cliche but that saying 'the world is a darker place without him in it' has never rung so true!
Bridie Bhoy
Well-known member
Legend07
Well-known member
Got sent this video just about ended me!
I was lucky enough to finally get to the holy grail that is Lisbon after a few failed attempts about 3 years ago.
Had a lump in my throat from the minute me and my wife got there. I managed to keep it together as I walked around the stadium taking it all in and it was everything and much more to fan of the greatest club in the world that my dad told me it was. I got to walk up the stairs the players walked up from the changing rooms imagining the lion legends singing “For it’s a grand old team to play for” led by Bertie, my wife thought it would be a good idea to video it by the time I got to the top of the stairs the tears where rolling down my face with happiness and pride for what Bertie and his fellow Lisbon lion legends gave to all celtic fans that where old enough to see it and be there to ones like myself that lived off of story’s from there fathers and watched videos and dvds of that great day.
You and all the lions will live forever in the hearts of all celtic fans for what you all achieved. God bless you Bertie you are a true Legend RIP
Been so upset with the sad news of Bertie Auld and this video has just blown me away altogether.
My favourite legend and with his sheer class of a man in every way possible, summed up what been celtic is all about.
A true Celtic great and legend who will never be forgotten
Thoughts and prayers for the Auld family at this very sad time, but were so blessed to have had such a truly wonderful man within there family, like we all had within the Celtic family
HH and YNWA
JamSam67 messaged me asking if I could post Niall's tribute to Bertie which is up on The Celtic Star. Here it is...
They say kids are intuitive, don’t they? And I think that is true.
I spent today travelling north from London, before meeting a good friend who himself had lost a friend today and tried at least to keep his mind off his loss. However temporarily.
I then headed home, watched and reported on a Celtic team who made a Cup Final for the Celtic Star, before running a bath for my six-year-old and preparing for another ordinary Sunday night, in preparation for another run of the mill Monday morning.
It was then the phone rumbled with that first text message from that same friend, telling me of the passing of Bertie Auld.
Perhaps my mood changed, perhaps my heart sank, and perhaps the front you are taught to portray slipped for a moment. But my six-year-old sensed it. He asked me if I was okay and I told him a Celtic player had died. He asked me who it was, and I knew he’d be worried it would be the player he calls Mr McGregor, so I explained it was an old Celtic player, one of the Lisbon Lions. ‘You mean one form the photograph on the wall?’ Yes, one of those I said’. Another one I thought.
With every passing year, one by one, those famous men pass on. Such is the passing of time and the close proximity of their ages, I guess the inevitability of it being a regular occurrence now rings true. But they say legends live on in the passing of their stories. So, after towelling my lad down and drying his hair, he asked me to show him which player it was.
It was already therapeutic to talk about Bertie out loud, explain he was the effervescent character in a team of individuals who blended into the greatest football team in Scottish football history, never mind the legends of Celtic as a football club alone.
So, I explained for my own sake as much as his, why Bertie Auld was the fan with the shirt, the man with the stories to tell and the one who wore his heart on his sleeve.
But my lad just wanted to see the face on that picture, wanted to put an image to the story of the man he probably, even now as he lies on the couch beside me as I type this, has little idea of the significance of the man’s place in Celtic folklore and history. Not only as one of our most influential players, but also as one of our most everlasting supporters.
And just like you, me, and the lad lying beside me right now could claim to be a fan, Bertie can claim that first and foremost, but could also claim that place as one of the greatest legends ever to grace the Hoops.
Yet I wonder if he ever thought that honour was anything more than fortitude, an opportunity handed to him which other Celtic supporters may not have achieved, yet an opportunity and experience he simply wished to share with every supporter he came across from then until now.
Was he honoured to be a Lisbon Lion? You bet he was. But was he honoured to be a Celtic supporter who achieved that legendary and immortal status? I can’t answer that but I have a fair inkling as to the answer.
So now he has gone and with him another brick in the wall of Celtic’s immortal Lisbon Lions. Yet Bertie Auld lives on. He lives on with every intuitive kid who asks you tonight who Bertie Auld was and why you are sad. And when you show him that image on your wall and explain he was that man, the one with the shirt who sang in Lisbon and regaled us all with the stories for years to come, it doesn’t stop there.
Instead, you pass it on and your intuitive and inquisitive kid will soak it up, take the image and the stories to his heart and when you too are gone will pick up the baton and pass it on again.
Because that is the Celtic Song, the words Bertie Auld sang in Lisbon, and did so ever so proudly.
‘For its a grand old team to play for’, as it is to support. And when it comes to Bertie Auld, I doubt he differentiated between the two. It was just as much an honour to follow as it was to play for Celtic, and that is worth passing on tonight.
Niall J
They say kids are intuitive, don’t they? And I think that is true.
I spent today travelling north from London, before meeting a good friend who himself had lost a friend today and tried at least to keep his mind off his loss. However temporarily.
I then headed home, watched and reported on a Celtic team who made a Cup Final for the Celtic Star, before running a bath for my six-year-old and preparing for another ordinary Sunday night, in preparation for another run of the mill Monday morning.
It was then the phone rumbled with that first text message from that same friend, telling me of the passing of Bertie Auld.
Perhaps my mood changed, perhaps my heart sank, and perhaps the front you are taught to portray slipped for a moment. But my six-year-old sensed it. He asked me if I was okay and I told him a Celtic player had died. He asked me who it was, and I knew he’d be worried it would be the player he calls Mr McGregor, so I explained it was an old Celtic player, one of the Lisbon Lions. ‘You mean one form the photograph on the wall?’ Yes, one of those I said’. Another one I thought.
With every passing year, one by one, those famous men pass on. Such is the passing of time and the close proximity of their ages, I guess the inevitability of it being a regular occurrence now rings true. But they say legends live on in the passing of their stories. So, after towelling my lad down and drying his hair, he asked me to show him which player it was.
It was already therapeutic to talk about Bertie out loud, explain he was the effervescent character in a team of individuals who blended into the greatest football team in Scottish football history, never mind the legends of Celtic as a football club alone.
So, I explained for my own sake as much as his, why Bertie Auld was the fan with the shirt, the man with the stories to tell and the one who wore his heart on his sleeve.
But my lad just wanted to see the face on that picture, wanted to put an image to the story of the man he probably, even now as he lies on the couch beside me as I type this, has little idea of the significance of the man’s place in Celtic folklore and history. Not only as one of our most influential players, but also as one of our most everlasting supporters.
And just like you, me, and the lad lying beside me right now could claim to be a fan, Bertie can claim that first and foremost, but could also claim that place as one of the greatest legends ever to grace the Hoops.
Yet I wonder if he ever thought that honour was anything more than fortitude, an opportunity handed to him which other Celtic supporters may not have achieved, yet an opportunity and experience he simply wished to share with every supporter he came across from then until now.
Was he honoured to be a Lisbon Lion? You bet he was. But was he honoured to be a Celtic supporter who achieved that legendary and immortal status? I can’t answer that but I have a fair inkling as to the answer.
So now he has gone and with him another brick in the wall of Celtic’s immortal Lisbon Lions. Yet Bertie Auld lives on. He lives on with every intuitive kid who asks you tonight who Bertie Auld was and why you are sad. And when you show him that image on your wall and explain he was that man, the one with the shirt who sang in Lisbon and regaled us all with the stories for years to come, it doesn’t stop there.
Instead, you pass it on and your intuitive and inquisitive kid will soak it up, take the image and the stories to his heart and when you too are gone will pick up the baton and pass it on again.
Because that is the Celtic Song, the words Bertie Auld sang in Lisbon, and did so ever so proudly.
‘For its a grand old team to play for’, as it is to support. And when it comes to Bertie Auld, I doubt he differentiated between the two. It was just as much an honour to follow as it was to play for Celtic, and that is worth passing on tonight.
Niall J
Spherical Planet
Well-known member
There is a belief that the division between the younger generation and those in their golden years is a gap too wide to span.
Perhaps that is the case in the digital age where kids rarely communicate with each other unless it's with their thumbs or on their social media weapon of choice.
This is where you begin to identify the sheer magnitude of Bertie's aura, charisma and personality.
He is/was the perfect link in the generational chain. The missing sequence in a DNA strand. Someone who brought young and old together as one. The young team in the North Curve will be singing word for word with the octogenarian next time out.
The wee lass likely being at one of her first games will be singing along wie the grand old Dame who was there when Celtic stuck 7 past Niven.
This man and this moment will be imprinted upon them for the rest of their lives and they'll mark their own with that imprint for generations to come.
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K
kelly
Guest
Smelltheg-love
Well-known member
I was there that night but had to go home after the grub due to 'an emergency'.
Was effin sick at the time and more so when i heard all about it next day,
but a pregnant woman was in distress,
turned out after 5 hours in A&E she was 'just constipated'.
RIP Bertie, as real a celtic man as there has ever been
Hoopy427
Well-known member
Of all our players past and present Bertie was the one I most wanted to meet, I never seen him play it was his stories, his character, his enthusiasm and his love for life and for Celtic that endeared me to him and to Celtic. To me he embodied Celtic more than anyone else because Celtic filled his heart with joy, not bitterness or anger.
As someone said earlier he was gallus, in fact that word was surely created to describe Bertie!
One things for sure there will surely never be another Bertie Auld.
As someone said earlier he was gallus, in fact that word was surely created to describe Bertie!
One things for sure there will surely never be another Bertie Auld.
DILLIGAF
Well-known member
Well said the Jam ManJust saw the start of Strictly they did Walk on mind was on Bertie and all the Lions we’ve lost That’s some Team Jock has up there. Was watching Bertie and Bobby talking with Jeff Stelling then singing
For its a Grand AULD team to play for.
Wiping water from my eyes but these tears are for a Diamond in a Team of Pearls
Cheers Mr Auld
HH
lcafiero
Well-known member
Davie McLaughlin, as many of you know, guides tours of Celtic Park (and he's definitely a follow on Twitter for Celtic fans). He posted this on Sunday, and I think there are ninjas chopping onions somewhere in the house. It speaks volumes about the kind of guy Bertie Auld was.
