Celtic Park is a football stadium and the home of Scottish Premiership team Celtic, in the Parkhead area of Glasgow, Scotland. With a capacity of 60,411, it is the largest football stadium in Scotland, and the eighth-largest football stadium in the United Kingdom. It is often known as Parkhead, and nicknamed Paradise.
Celtic was formed in 1887 and the first Celtic Park opened in Parkhead in 1888. The club moved to the current site in 1892, after the rental charge was greatly increased on the first. The new site was developed into an oval-shaped stadium, with vast terracing sections. The record attendance of 83,500 was set at an Old Firm derby on 1 January 1938. The terraces were covered and floodlights installed between 1957 and 1971. The Taylor Report mandated that major clubs should have all-seater stadia by August 1994. Celtic was in a poor financial position in the early 1990s and no major work was carried out until Fergus McCann took control of the club in March 1994. The old terraces were demolished to develop a new stadium in a phased rebuild completed in August 1998. A section of rail seating was installed in 2016.
Celtic Park has been used as a venue for Scotland internationals and cup finals when Hampden Park has been unavailable. Before the First World War, Celtic Park hosted composite rules shinty-hurling, track and field and the 1897 Track Cycling World Championships. Open-air Masses and First World War recruitment drives were also held there. Celtic Park hosted the opening ceremony of the 2014 Commonwealth Games and has also been used for concerts by the Who and U2.
History Original Celtic Park (1888–1892) Celtic was formed in November 1887. The original Celtic Park was built at the north east junction of Springfield Road and London Road in Parkhead by a volunteer workforce within six months of formation. Its opening game was a match between Hibernian and Cowlairs. Celtic played its first match on 28 May 1888 at Celtic Park, against Rangers, which Celtic won 5–2. It hosted a British Home Championship match between Scotland and Ireland on 28 March 1891. Celtic was forced to leave this site in 1892, however, when the landlord increased the annual rent from £50 to £450.
New Celtic Park (1892–1904)
The new stadium was built in a disused brickyard at Janefield Street, 200 yards from the old site. The first turf, which had been transported from County Donegal, was laid by Irish patriot Michael Davitt and planted with shamrocks. He recited a verse that said the turf would "take root and flourish", but it was stolen soon afterwards. A journalist said the move was like "leaving the graveyard to enter paradise", which led to the ground being nicknamed "Paradise". The new Celtic Park was opened on 20 August 1892 with a match against Renton. A journalist writing in the Athletic News described Celtic Park as the best ground in Britain at the time, a title for which it may only have been challenged by Goodison Park, the home of Everton. Celtic Park was immediately successful, attracting record gate receipts and an attendance of 45,107 for the Scotland v England game in the 1894 British Home Championship. Celtic purchased the site for £100,000 in 1897.
The new stadium initially consisted of terracing with a capacity of approximately 40,000. It was an elongated oval shape, similar to Hampden Park. A running track and concrete cycling track were also constructed around the periphery of the pitch. On the northern side of the pitch there was a pavilion and a seated stand. An experimental floodlit football game was played on Christmas Day 1893. This was unsuccessful due to the ball repeatedly striking the lamps, which were hung over the pitch by wiring. In 1894, Celtic built the first ever press box at a football stadium in Britain, located high up on the main stand at Celtic Park. Later in the 1890s, club director James Grant financed the construction of an enclosed windowed stand (completed in 1899), built on stilts on the south side of the pitch. The spectators watched through sliding windows from padded seats, but they had to climb four flights of stairs to reach their position and the windows frequently steamed up.
Fire and rebuilding (1904–1957)
In May 1904, a fire destroyed the older north grandstand and severely damaged the adjacent pavilion; this prompted Celtic to buy the newer Grant Stand outright. The north enclosure was rebuilt by the following year.
By 1927, the Grant Stand had become unsafe and was demolished, to be replaced in summer 1929 by a new single-tier Main Stand, designed by Duncan and Kerr. This stand, which cost £35,000 and provided 4,800 seats, was smaller and less ornate than the Main Stand at Ibrox. The Celtic Park main stand had a similar feature to Ibrox, however, in the pedimented roof gable over the press box. Prior to its completion, the old pavilion on the opposite side of the field which dated from the original construction of the ground in 1892 and had partly escaped the 1904 fire (it had been 'reduced to cinders' in that blaze according to hastily filed contemporary reports) burned down entirely in March 1929, destroying some of the club's old records and photographs (the trophies were stored elsewhere). The club had to play the rest of their matches in the 1928–29 season at nearby Shawfield Stadium (reciprocating an earlier arrangement in 1914 when Clyde suffered similar damage to their ground) and also had to replace the roof of the stand next to the pavilion, which then became known as the "Hayshed".
Although it was only the third biggest ground in Glasgow, the rebuilt Celtic Park had a greater capacity than any club stadium in England. The record attendance for a Celtic match at Celtic Park was set by an Old Firm derby against Rangers on New Year's Day 1938. Some sources give the attendance for this game as 92,000, but contemporary sources suggest that the attendance was approximately 83,500.
Stadium improvements (1957–1990)
Significant improvements were carried out between 1957 and 1971, partly due to the great success Celtic achieved under the management of Jock Stein. A roof was built over the back of the western "Celtic End" terrace in 1957, while floodlights were installed in 1959. They were first used on 12 October, in a friendly match against Wolves. The northern "Hayshed" terrace, which became known as the "Jungle", was concreted in 1966 and a new roof was erected. A roof was built over the eastern "Rangers End" terrace in 1967, using the same design as the Rangers End at Hampden Park. All of this work meant that Celtic had more covered terracing than any other stadium in Britain, except Wembley. There were 4,800 seats, all in the Main Stand, in an overall capacity of 80,000. A further 3,900 seats were installed in the Main Stand paddock area in 1971. A new roof was erected over the Main Stand in 1971, which cost £250,000. It was supported by a "goalpost" framework, with the top girder measuring 97.5 metres long. The design was flawed, however, as the roof provided little shelter to the paddock seats, and retractable columns had to be installed to provide stability in case of high winds or heavy snow. Celtic later sued the designers and won damages.
The regulations in the Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975 reduced the capacity of Celtic Park to 56,500, but the club then increased the terracing to raise capacity to 67,000. In 1986, £1 million was spent on replacing the western terrace roof with a replica of the eastern terrace, which had been designed nearly twenty years earlier. The original red brick facade to the Main Stand was replaced during the club's centenary year in 1988, while lounges and offices were installed. Although the Main Stand had been modernised, terracing was still predominant at Celtic Park. This stood in contrast to most other major stadia in Britain, particularly Ibrox, where seating capacities had been increased. This left Celtic badly placed when the Taylor Report mandated that all major clubs had to have an all-seater stadium.
Proposed moves and redevelopment as all-seated stadium (1990–1994)
Celtic was heavily in debt and had been significantly outgrown by Rangers commercially in the early 1990s. The Celtic board initially prevaricated in response to the Taylor Report, partly due to divisions in the board. Celtic director Brian Dempsey proposed a development on land he controlled at Robroyston, but he was opposed by fellow directors, Michael Kelly and Chris White, who had Dempsey removed from the board. Despite these divisions, a proposal to build a new 52,000-seat stadium on industrial waste ground at Cambuslang was unveiled in April 1992. The £100 million scheme was meant to include wider commercial developments that would fund the completed stadium, which would have only provided 32,000 seats in a first phase of construction. There was scepticism about the plan, however, as it was unclear how Celtic or their partner in the project, Superstadia, would raise the necessary finance. The proposed site would have had to be decontaminated, and contradictory statements about the ownership structure of the development were issued. Outline planning permission was granted in May 1993.
A deadline of August 1994 had been set to convert all major grounds to be fully seated. Even with planning permission granted, the first phase of the Cambuslang scheme would not be ready until 1995. As a stop-gap measure, Celtic installed 5,033 seats in the Jungle at the end of the 1992–93 season, at a cost of £350,000. The board hoped Celtic would be given a special dispensation from the rules. Installing seats in the Jungle itself caused an emotional reaction. Due to redevelopment work at Hampden, the 1993 Scottish Cup final between Rangers and Aberdeen was to be played at Celtic Park. This meant that in the last competitive game in front of the Jungle, it would have been occupied by Rangers fans. To give the Celtic supporters last use, a friendly match between veteran Celtic and Manchester United players was arranged.
During the 1993–94 season, the board continued to talk optimistically about their plans. They claimed in February to have £20 million of funding in place from Gefinor, a Swiss financial institution. The claim was denied by Gefinor, who denied that they had even had any contact with the club. Celtic then came under severe pressure from the Bank of Scotland, who demanded a £1 million reduction in the club's overdraft, placing the club under threat of bankruptcy. With minutes to spare before a deadline set by the Bank, the board capitulated and sold control to Scots-Canadian businessman Fergus McCann.
Redevelopment (1994–2011)
McCann quickly discarded the Cambuslang scheme and instead started plans to bring Celtic Park into compliance with the Taylor Report. The capacity would have been only 34,000 if seats had been installed in the remaining terraces, which nevertheless was greater than Celtic's average attendance in the previous six seasons. McCann, who believed the club could fill a much larger stadium, decided instead to effectively build a new stadium. In the summer of 1994, the Jungle, East Terracing and West Terracing were demolished, with only the structure of the Main Stand left intact. The relatively new Jungle seats were used to refresh the seating in the Main Stand. Celtic played their home games at Hampden Park during the 1994–95 season, which cost the club £500,000 in rent. Celtic raised over £26 million to fund the work from two share issues: £12.3 million in a rights issue (£9.4 million invested by McCann) and £14 million in a public offering. 10,000 ordinary fans bought into the public offering, while season ticket sales rose from 7,000 to 26,000.