Celtic fined for banners

SCOTTISH giants Celtic were fined $77,000 by UEFA yesterday for a banner deemed ‘‘illicit’’ by the European football governing body.

Fans of the Scottish champions known as the Green Brigade held up a banner displaying an image of IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands alongside Scottish nationalist hero William Wallace.

The banner also included a line saying: ‘‘The terrorist or the dreamer?’’

UEFA rules prohibit messages of a political or ideological nature.

The Celtic supporters’ group the Green Brigade, insisted the banners were football-related as they were designed to protest against the Scottish Government’s Offensive Behaviour at Football Act and Police Scotland’s implementation of the legislation, which it claims has criminalised expressions of Irish politics.