Former boss looks back on EK Celtic
Former boss Billy Ogilvie reckons chucking the Celtic team line on the floor before their blockbuster Scottish Cup tie with the Hoops was key for East Kilbride.
Kilby reached the last-16 of the Scottish Cup back in 2016 as the Lowland League side lined up against Ronnie Deila’s multi-million pound side at New Broomfield.
It a hard-fought clash the K-Park outfit were only narrowly fired down by goals from Leigh Griffiths and Colin Kazim-Richards.
However, Ogilvie thinks the secret to their impressive display against the likes of Scott Brown, Kieran Tierney, James Forrest and Dedryck Boyata was his pre-game tough-talking in the dressing room.
“There was so much excitement about the game,” he said.
“Everybody was buzzing and the players were all wanting to be involved. It was a fantastic time and the preparation couldn’t have been better.
“I was in the dressing room and I was going through the team. I was starting to give my team talk and there is a chap at the door.
“It was the Celtic team line and the boy passed it to me. I threw it on the floor and told the boys ‘it doesn’t matter who they have, it’s all about what we do’.
“I went right into it tactically and got everyone clued up.
“It wasn’t until they went to the warm up I picked the team up and had to go for a wee cup of tea!
“I was thinking ‘oh my God, there is Tierney, there is Boyata, there is Griffiths, there is Brown, there is Forrest’ – there is so many medals and international caps between them.
“I had to do a wee bit of drama with the team!”
Calm and collected Billy revealed he even asked the Parkhead boss to join him for a cuppa.
“I asked Ronnie if he would like to go for a cup of tea but he said to me he has a pre-game routine,” he added.
“I understood that, he was very courteous– but that shows how serious he was taking East Kilbride and the game.”
Ogilvie says the players should look back on the afternoon with prides as they came up against some top talent in the eventual Premiership champions.
“A concern we did have was the size of the team. Charlie Mulgrew, Efe Ambrose, Colin Kazim-Richards; they were a big physical team.
“We worked on set-pieces and how they were going to be a big threat.
“Their two goals came from a corner; and in the first goal Leigh Griffiths hits it with his hand to get it over.
“In the second there was a couple of breaks that didn’t go our way after we defended the first ball well.
“It’s an absolute credit to the players discipline that day and the shift they put in.
“I couldn’t say we got up the part a lot but it was difficult to keep the ball from those international players.”