The importance of football in urban Scotland.

Rangers and Celtic will probably never just be football teams, but in Scotland football will never just be a game. 33

One aspect of life in Scotland that has witnessed a notable amount of sectarian violence is football, particularly related to the Glasgow teams Celtic and Rangers. Glasgow Rangers were formed by Protestant Highlanders in 1873, Celtic later formed in 1888 by a group of Irish Catholic immigrants. Rangers play in the blue, white and red of the Union Jack; Celtic in the green and white of the Irish flag. Rangers' supporters often sing during matches about Protestant victories in Irish history and in Glasgow gang-battles 34; Celtic's sing ‘rebel songs' celebrating Irish independence. In addition to this, until 1989 Rangers operated a very public ‘no-Catholic' policy with players 35. Large-scale violence between the two sets of supporters dates back as far as a riot in 1909 36, and continues to the present day. Again, the severity of sectarian football hooliganism in Scotland has never escalated to the grenade-throwing level experienced in Belfast 37, although it is still an unpleasant manifestation of the conflicting identities within urban Scotland.

On an international level the Scotland team has often provided a channel for nationalist sentiment, and is a considered a source of national pride. It is even seen as a concrete example of Scotland's nationhood,

it's [the team's] fortunes are anxiously followed by Scots of all classes, religions, regions, ages and sexes. Football matches between Scotland and England are said to be a contemporary ritual reenactment of the great Battle of Bannockburn in 1314. 38

One could therefore be forgiven for thinking that, in the face of all this internal division, at least Scotland's national team enjoyed a wide, unified base of support. This was proved otherwise in Raymond Boyle's empirical study of Celtic supporters, many of whom expressed an affinity with Eire's football team rather than Scotland's, mainly due to a perceived bias in the non-selection of Celtic players for the national team 39. Interestingly, this leads to examples of dual-nationalism,

I'm Scottish, I'm thinking about it in two senses. If I go abroad and meet someone, they'll ask me where I'm from, and I'll say ‘Scotland' and I'm Scottish cos that's where I've been born and brought up, but there is always in your mind that most of your characteristics are portrayed through the Irish way of feeling, you've got that. 40

Boyle's survey revealed that 43% of those interviewed share this view, and it is most prevalent amongst under-25s 41. This apparent identification with another, distinctly non-Scottish identity provides yet another source of conflict within urban Scotland. This survey was taken at a time when Irish football had gained worldwide fame following a successful World Cup performance, and certainly the enthusiastic reaction of Celtic fans at recent Scotland matches (particularly those played at Celtic Park), coupled with the large number of Celtic players involved, seem to suggest that the Scottish national team, with its strong badge of identity, is now proving to be a source of unity amongst all Scottish football fans, both urban and rural, and Protestant and Catholic.