Brown loves passing test in Euro education
LAsT Wednesday night’s 4-0 home win against Linfield in a Champions League secondround qualifier saw scott Brown set a new record for appearances in European football by a scottish player.
But the Celtic captain would have been forgiven for fearing his very first match in the group stage of the continent’s elite competition a decade ago would also prove his last.
After just eight minutes, gordon strachan’s side trailed big-spending shakhtar Donetsk 2-0 to goals from Brandao and Cristiano Lucarelli.
In the cacophonous olimpiyskyi stadium, one voice stood out to Brown above all others as the positionally ill-disciplined midfielder was subjected to a ferocious hairdryer blast from his cantankerous manager.
Celtic bounced back from that opening-day loss to reach the knockouts under strachan, while Brown, a Treble-winning skipper last season, will celebrate a stellar 10 years at Celtic by unfurling the league flag before the opening game of the new campaign against Hearts.
But on that dark night in Ukraine in september 2007, thoughts that he would one day make 83 European appearances — one beyond the landmark record set by former Rangers captain Barry Ferguson — could not have been further from the young midfielder’s mind.
‘My first European game for Celtic was against shakhtar Donetsk and the gaffer came out screaming at me when I was up the pitch, pressing their goalie,’ said Brown. ‘I was playing centre midfield and he told me to get over to right midfield and “settle down”. We were losing 2-0.
‘European football is an education but so were the words that came out of gordon strachan’s mouth that night.
‘It was a hard one to take but we managed to get through that group in the end, so it was a good lesson. ‘You learn as you go along and I’m a totally different player now to what I was back then.
‘I came to Celtic as an attacking midfielder, just running about and chasing. gordon slowly got that out of me, got me playing better for the team rather than just for myself.’
Brown’s European debut came in July 2004 for Hibs in a 1-1 draw against Lithuanian side Vetra at Easter Road in the Intertoto Cup. The Leith club side lost 2-1 on aggregate.
‘We got pumped,’ the combative 32-year-old grimaced. ‘We only got into the tournament through a Fair Play place. Fair play with me in the team? What are the chances of that?’
The Celtic captain’s 83 European appearances place him ahead of Celtic, Liverpool and scotland legend Kenny Dalglish and Dundee United’s Rolls Royce defender David Narey. But Brown does not welcome any comparisons.
‘There are some great names on the list, like Kenny Dalglish, but those were different times back then,’ he said.
‘We’ve got six qualifiers now just to get into the Champions League while guys back then got straight into the European Cup.
‘But it’s a great honour. I came to Celtic to play in Europe, to play in the Champions League, and to play against the best players in the world. That’s why I’ve stayed here so long.
‘Could I get to 100 appearances in Europe? It would be great if I could but I will just take it season by season.’
For Brown, the memories from appearing in the Champions League group stage over the past 10 years are both rich and vivid.
His favourite match and most admired opponent trip easily off the tongue.
‘My favourite European memory? Tommy Burns jumping on top of us after we beat spartak Moscow in the penalty shoot-out to reach the group stage in 2007,’ said Brown.
‘That was great — daft Tam piling on top of us all. It showed what it meant to reach the group stage — from a money point of view and to play on that stage. To hear that Champions League music blaring out before kick-off.
‘Andres Iniesta of Barcelona (below) was my toughest opponent. The way he receives the ball, drops deep, then drives at you directly is impressive. His quick feet are amazing.
‘You think you are getting close to him and then his pace takes him away from you. But it’s great to get to that stage.’
Tomorrow, Brown and Celtic’s European journey continues when Norwegians Rosenborg come to town in the first leg of the third round of Champions League qualifiers.
The Celtic captain admits he is driven on to reach the group stage once more by the prospect of finally facing the one major European superpower he has yet to come up against. And perhaps even shatter the glass ceiling of the knockout stage for a third time.
‘We haven’t played Real Madrid. I would like a kick at a few of them,’ he grinned. ‘We played them in a friendly in America in 2012. But I was meeting up with scotland a couple of days later so it wasn’t worth the flight going out to Philadelphia to play then coming straight back again. It would be great if we could get through and draw them.’