Pierre van Hooijdonk still irked at Celtic’s failure to stop Rangers’ 9-in-a-row

Former Parkhead striker on why 1995/96 campaign was his most frustrating
Pierre van Hooijdonk during Celtic’s 1995-96 campaign, when the Parkhead side lost one league game all season but still couldn’t catch Rangers. Picture: SNSPierre van Hooijdonk during Celtic’s 1995-96 campaign, when the Parkhead side lost one league game all season but still couldn’t catch Rangers. Picture: SNS
Pierre van Hooijdonk during Celtic’s 1995-96 campaign, when the Parkhead side lost one league game all season but still couldn’t catch Rangers. Picture: SNS

Pierre van Hooijdonk will always harbour regrets over Celtic’s failure to derail Rangers’ record-equalling run of nine consecutive league title wins during his spell with the Parkhead club.

For the former Dutch international striker, the greatest source of dismay was the 1995-96 campaign when he was top scorer with 26 goals for a swashbuckling Celtic side which lost just one league match all season under Tommy Burns’ management but still fell short of halting Walter Smith’s relentless Rangers team.

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“When I arrived [in January 1995], the team was not of Celtic standard,” recalls van Hooijdonk. “But that summer, Tommy brought in some really good players and we played some attractive, attacking football.

Celtic boss Tommy Burns unveils new signing Pierre van Hooijdonk in January 1995. Picture: SNSCeltic boss Tommy Burns unveils new signing Pierre van Hooijdonk in January 1995. Picture: SNS
Celtic boss Tommy Burns unveils new signing Pierre van Hooijdonk in January 1995. Picture: SNS

“We were scoring goals for fun and winning games for fun, but we still could not catch Rangers. They had Brian Laudrup and Paul Gascoigne. I was frustrated. We all were.

“We lost just one game, but we 
still finished four points behind. We maybe didn’t feel we were a better team than Rangers but we felt we were more of a team.

“But Rangers had pure class in their individual players who could easily win games for them. Around November time, we felt we were really a force, probably stronger.

“But, again, they had Laudrup. He was different class. He p***** the Scottish League, with two fingers in his nose.

“Seriously, I’d never seen a guy playing on the highest level make football look so easy. If necessary, he just put his feet on the gas pedals and ‘boom!’. Or he would create something special. He was magnificent.

“But, don’t forget, Celtic came from far behind. Tommy was building a new team. Rangers had dominated Scottish football for a few years and nobody expected us to change that immediately. We came unbelievably close to winning the league, but we didn’t.

“Not winning the league the following season was probably more frustrating because you recognised your own team as being capable of winning it.”

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Van Hooijdonk left Celtic for Nottingham Forest before the 1997-98 campaign when, under his compatriot Wim Jansen, they succeeded in stopping Rangers making it ten-in-a-row.

That pressure will fall on Steven Gerrard and his Rangers squad in the coming season when they will need to find the qualities and characteristics Van Hooijdonk says are essential in overcoming a more dominant rival.

“What was missing in our group? Maybe the experience of winning,” he told The Lockdown Tactics podcast.

“The top players at Rangers had all played for big clubs in Europe and there was always pressure on them to win the title.

“The players Celtic signed were very good players but they came from smaller clubs. So, you have to adapt to that winning attitude and it takes time.

“It was the same for me. It is a different pressure and a different mentality. If we dropped points then the whole week was miserable.

“I had a high level of expectation at Celtic and I knew I had to deliver. I joined the club not long after the loss to Raith Rovers in the League Cup final. That was a major disappointment.

“As a striker you want to start really well. I was lucky to do it after nine minutes or so, maybe my best goal of my Celtic career. My debut goal against Hearts was a special memory. That kept the fans calm and they started to believe I could do well.

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“But we did win the Scottish Cup in 1995 against Airdrie. It was unbelievable to win the cup. I started the game with a hamstring injury. I picked it up at Seamill on the lawn there in the build-up preparations.

“I was very doubtful but I wanted to play. It was my first final. It was great to score, to get on the end of Tosh McKinlay’s cross. I had to come off in the first half as my hamstring was sore.

“It was a horrible final, we didn’t really play well. But I was so happy we won. It was great for Tommy Burns and the supporters.”

Van Hooijdonk retains great affection for Burns, who sadly died in 2008 at the age of 51.

“On the day I signed for Celtic, I was at the hotel at night having dinner with my family and Tommy arrived with a pile of VHS video tapes and photographs of Celtic and told me to watch and look at them to find out about the history of the club,” he recalls.

“He ended up staying for a bite to eat with my parents. I watched the tapes and looked at the photos. It was a nice introduction to a great club.

“Tommy was very good at people management because his heart was always there, every hour of every day. If players were a little bit grumpy, then he would put an arm around them and make them smile.

“As a coach, he also went to other countries to see how they were doing things. He wanted to learn and he wanted his players to learn. He was a young manager and open minded to new ideas.”

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The much-travelled Van Hooijdonk scored 375 goals in 634 career appearances for nine clubs and regards his role in Feyenoord’s 2002 Uefa Cup winning side, including a defeat of Rangers, as the highlight.

“I was so happy when I played for Feyenoord and we knocked out Rangers,” he says. “The frustration of not being able to win the title with Celtic was always there, so this win was my biggest revenge for that.

“I scored two identical free-kicks in the second leg in Rotterdam. There was a little too much panic and fear in the Rangers wall, and Lorenzo Amoruso was maybe going to stand on the goal line.

“If you look at the photos of the wall for the second free-kick, the guys were not the bravest. I still have fun with my old international team-mates Arthur Numan and Ronald de Boer about it, as they had their faces covered. If the wall had jumped, I’m sure both of the free-kicks would not have gone in.

“I used to practice free-kicks almost every day, so it was always nice when they went in. We went on to win the Uefa Cup that season and that was a great moment, to win it in our own stadium against Borussia Dortmund.”

The Lockdown Tactics is a brand new podcast, hosted by former Scotland stars Robert Snodgrass and Kris Boyd. Every week TLT will interview big names with the core focus being on mental health and wellbeing.

It’s chosen charity partner is The Kris Boyd Charity.

To watch the full interview with Pierre van Hooijdonk, go to YouTube and the various TLT social platforms. It will 
be available from 4pm today.

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