When Billy McNeill died, it was Bertie Auld who famously said the club had lost ‘Mr Celtic’.

However, comedian and actor Des McLean reckons that Auld himself deserved that moniker every bit as much and that he epitomised Celtic as a football club.

Auld hailed from Maryhill in Glasgow. He was gallus and he was extremely proud of it. He was also "everybody's pal" and a "born raconteur".

McLean – who has been playing Auld in Jim Orr’s stage play Bend It Like Bertie – believes that a fitting epitaph to the Lisbon Lion would be for Celtic to rename the tunnel inside Paradise ‘The Ten-Thirty Tunnel’ in honour of Auld’s rhyming slang nickname.

He also insists that the iconic image of Auld in a fedora hat, bare-chested, clutching the match ball and a Leeds top after Celtic's European Cup semi-final triumph at Hampden in 1970 should be immortalised in a statue in his birthplace of Maryhill.

McLean said: "Bertie was a force of nature and he would genuinely stop and chat with anybody that wanted to speak to him. He loved all that.

“It could be a grandparent or a grandchild. It didn't matter. He made people feel brilliant around him. He had a remarkable way with him. He gave you that personal touch. Bertie loved a blether.

"When Billy McNeill died he referred to him as Mr Celtic but it was really himself he was talking about too – Bertie was Mr Celtic.

“The reason I think that is that he is the ultimate ambassador for the football club. He was a ‘professional’ Celtic fan. Everybody loves Bertie and Bertie loved Celtic with a passion.

“He also loved a sing-song. If somebody had said to me ‘Des, if you can play a Celtic player on stage who would it be?’ It would be Bertie Auld every day of the week and twice on a Sunday.

Celtic Way:

“He was charismatic and a funny, funny man. Billy Connolly even said he should have been a comedian because he had great comedic timing – his patter was electric, he was such a loveable guy, a warm human being.

“They are all Glasgow traits and he is the ultimate ‘wee guy from Maryhill’. He was a born raconteur if ever there was one. They should change the urban dictionary definition of gallus to 'see Bertie Auld'. He was gallus in every sense. Pure Glasgow gallus.

"That picture of Bertie after Celtic have just defeated one of the finest sides in Europe football at Hampden Park in the European Cup semi-final in 1970 is the most gallus image ever.

“That is the ultimate photo of gallusness. It is the cockiest image of them all. They should erect a statue of that photo in Maryhill – it would be the equivalent of the Venus De Milo. Naming the tunnel at Celtic Park 'the Ten-Thirty Tunnel' is one of the greatest ideas I have ever heard.

"Every Celtic supporter had met Bertie and they have a wee personal story about him. Rangers fans adored him too, they held him in the highest esteem. Guys like Bertie, Tommy Burns and Walter Smith bridged the divide. Both sets of supporters liked them for whatever reason. You cannot argue with that."

  • Bend It Like Bertie will return to Glasgow's Pavilion Theatre from February 9 to 11 2023