My first visit to Ibrox for a Glasgow Derby occurred in December, 1979. I didn’t know it then, but I was watching the final curtain coming down on the era of the Lisbon Lions. The game itself was an unremarkable, if hard-fought 1-1 draw. But Celtic’s equaliser was scored by Bobby Lennox, who was the last of the Lions still playing for Celtic 12 years after the club's greatest-ever triumph against Inter Milan. It would turn out to be Bobby’s last-ever goal against Rangers. 

It may seem remarkable now, but at that time Celtic supporters were allocated a section of the Ibrox main stand and the old enclosure that sat beneath it, as well as the traditional Celtic end. The spectacle was everything I’d expected it to be and more and rendered all the more thrilling for being my first time in the citadel of our oldest rivals. 

I’ve attended around 30 Celtic games at Ibrox and can remember almost every one, save for a couple of draws in the early 1980s when Rangers were dire and our main title rivals were Aberdeen. Win, lose or draw, these matches were always special and possessed a unique cocktail of sensory experiences unmatched in any other fixture in Scotland or abroad. 

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Celtic and I also have an excellent record at Ibrox. I reckon I’ve seen Celtic win there more often than we’ve been defeated. This is largely due to being absent during Rangers’ nine-in-a-row period when I was working Saturdays in Edinburgh for The Scotsman and Scotland on Sunday.  Without doubt though, the most glorious period of Celtic victories at Ibrox occurred in the first Brendan Rodgers. For the first time in my lifetime, Celtic recorded four successive wins at the home of Rangers, including that famous 5-1 romp. I was with my friend, Pat Dunese that day and even as Mikael Lustig was burying the fifth we both knew we were unlikely ever again to experience the joy and privilege of witnessing Celtic giving Rangers such a hiding in their own backyard.     

We also knew that such a run couldn’t continue forever and that perhaps we’d also been one of a very privileged few thousand Celtic supporters in the entire history of the club not only to have been above to see four Ibrox victories on the trot, but also to have been present at every one of them. 

Sadly, if the current away ticket stand-off between Celtic and Rangers isn’t resolved, then we may have been the last ever to see one at all.  Let’s speak frankly here: this impasse is not of Celtic’s making and it’s not their responsibility to find a solution. Celtic have never had a problem with the presence of many thousands of Rangers supporters at Parkhead, no matter how often we’ve been beaten, and beaten soundly. The question of restricting their numbers has simply never arisen.  

Between 1989 and 2000 Rangers won so often at Parkhead that these games might as well have been home fixtures for them. It was never pleasant listening to 7,000 opposition supporters signing their songs as their players were administering a spanking to the Hoops on their own patch.

Yet, we wouldn’t have had it any other way. It just made the joy of beating Rangers in a future fixture all the more intense. And if we cared to admit it, the sight and sound of thousands of opposition fans at Parkhead has always been part of the drama and folklore of these matches. 

Supporters and the media are fond of deploying superlatives when we discuss football: the best-ever this; the worst-ever that; the biggest, the finest; the most famous. Yet, there is a valid case for claiming that the Celtic v Rangers game was once the most famous derby in world football. 

Certainly, the reasons for this being the case are not all rooted in good, honest, clean, football rivalry. But then, show me a local, big-ticket derby that is. All the big ones across the world are underpinned by cultural, social and class divisions that take them well beyond mere football.  The fact remains that, for better or for worse, the outcomes of Celtic v Rangers games are eagerly anticipated around the world. It’s also a fact though, that the absence of away supporters in these games for the last five years or so has damaged these occasions. 

To be clear: Celtic have absolutely no problem with the presence of a big Rangers contingent in our stadium. The custodians of Rangers though, quite clearly have a problem with large numbers of Celtic fans at Ibrox.  Everyone knows that Rangers would not have moved to slash our ticket allocation if Celtic hadn’t racked up those four successive victories. Only Rangers therefore, can bring an end to this stand-off. 

The Rangers board opted to do this as a means of securing an edge in these fixtures. As such, Celtic had a responsibility to their players and supporters to reciprocate in kind, albeit reluctantly. And besides, Celtic have secured two victories and a draw at Ibrox either without their fans or with very few of them. 

The history of these matches since Rangers’ return to the SPFL in 2016 has shown that they can only hope to win the title by taking something from their games against us at Parkhead. In maintaining this stalemate, Rangers are undermining the efforts of their players in doing just that. 

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Celtic also have a duty of care to their supporters, whose safety has been compromised as a result of being hemmed into a small corner of Ibrox surrounded on all sides by Rangers fans. This is why they have refused such a small allocation for next month’s derby. 

In Scotland, it’s our misfortune to be saddled with a morally repressive, faux liberal elite who pretend to be outraged by the shenanigans and malarkey that cling to these matches. They have no problem when Scotland and the UK makes business arrangements with the most brutal and repressive regimes on the planet, but routinely – when there’s some publicity to be had – they’ll wag their fingers and stamp their feet whenever the working class gets too loud or too politically incorrect for their comfort.

Some of them though, are now urging Celtic to cave in. It’s now beyond time that the club issued a detailed rebuttal of the inaccuracies and false narratives swirling around this issue.