Celtic fans will remember Boavista – A football Obituary from Glasgow

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The Celtic Star

·26 November 2025

Celtic fans will remember Boavista – A football Obituary from Glasgow

THE DEATH OF BOAVISTA – A FOOTBALL OBITUARY FROM GLASGOW WITH CONDOLENCES…

Edvaldsson scores against Boavista at Celtic Park, 5 November 1975. Celtic won 3-1. Photo The Celtic Wiki

I heard the news about Boavista’s liquidation the way you hear about a great aunt dying, not exactly surprising, but it still packs a punch.

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One of the old ones. One of the real ones. Not in restructuring, not in administration, not being handled by a holding company with the dexterity of a card sharp hiding an ace up his sleeve, no engine room subsidiaries, and no basket of assets sold apparently including “ra deed’s, the club’s history, records, and trophies.

No. Boavista. Are. Dead.

Not the polite Scottish version of death, with paperwork and a cosy PR narrative. I mean the Portuguese version, vultures circling the stadium, lights turned off, the smell of debt wafting through the streets of Porto like the aftermath of a binman strike. Death the old-fashioned way. Ashes. Gone. Nothing left but memories and heartbreak.

Dixie Deans scores for Celtic against Boavista at Celtic Park on 5 November 1975. Photo The Celtic Wiki

And the second the shock wore off, some tiny, wicked worm in the back of my brain laughed, well, Ibrox fans, imagine if your club hadn’t had half the establishment practising CPR on the corpse.

Because Boavista? They didn’t get the Scottish Treatment™. No emergency summit. No panicked suits murmuring about “the integrity of the league.” No moral gymnastics performed by men who wear oversized masonic rings and still call each other “Brother” in company emails.

Portugal took one look at Boavista’s financial guts, shrugged, and said – “Yep. That’s dead. Next.”

Meanwhile, Scotland in 2012 behaved like a televangelist trying to resurrect a wallet full of IOUs. The original Rangers keeled over like a sacred cow in a field full of unpaid tax bills, and instead of letting nature take its course, Scottish football reacted like someone had switched off life support for their favourite uncle, and a hospital administrator suggested all might be well if they just plugged it back in.

Suddenly everyone became a metaphysicist. “What is a club?” they asked, stroking their chins. “What is identity? What is continuity? What is liquidation really?”

Henrik Larsson of Celtic celebrates scoring the equalising goal during the UEFA Cup semi-final first leg match between Celtic and Boavista held on April 10, 2003 at Celtic Park. The match ended in a 1-1 draw. (Photo by Michael Steele/Getty Images)

Never had so many people deployed so much philosophical creativity to avoid saying the obvious. “Your club’s deid mate, beat it”.

But no, the resurrection plan was already in motion. The ghost was pushed back into the corpse with a set of new company documents and a fresh coat of legal paint, and hey presto! Up popped a reanimated beast demanding its history, trophies and sense of eternal superiority as if nothing had happened.

Boavista’s ghost won’t get that. Their ghost will wander Porto at 3am, clattering around empty bars and mumbling about its 2001 title win, and the UEFA Cup run that should’ve been theirs. Their fans will have to build a phoenix from the ground up with bloodied hands, not with Scottish football’s establishment whispering secret passwords and sliding rulebooks with highlighted passages under the table.

Henrik Larsson of Celtic celebrates scoring during the the UEFA Cup Semi-Final between Boavista FC and Glasgow Celtic held on April 24, 2003 at the Bessa Stadium in Porto, Portugal. Celtic won the match 1-0. (Photo by Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)

Celtic fans remember Boavista. The snarling semi-final. The clenched fists. Larsson breaking through like a goddamn Norse legend to send the Celts to Seville. Boavista were real opponents, the kind that made your stomach knot. That team deserved better than this scorched-earth ending.

Instead, they die properly. Rangers didn’t. Rangers died like a mafia accountant, quietly, diplomatically, surrounded by men who insisted nobody had seen anything.

And this is the tragedy, not just the death itself, but the absence of theatre. Boavista deserved to rage, to scream, to tear the sky open. Instead, they were ushered offstage with a muttered apology and the sound of paperwork being stamped by cold Portuguese hands.

Celtic Manager Martin O’Neill (C) hugs Celtic player Henrik Larsson as they celebrate the team’s 1-0 victory in the UEFA Cup semi-final match against Boavista FC April 24, 2003 at the Bessa Stadium in Porto, Portugal. (Photo by Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)

If Boavista somehow rise again, FC Boavista 1903, The Boavista, it will be earned through sweat and suffering. There will be no emergency handrails to grab. No league bosses whispering about “Armageddon.” No mysterious lawyers performing metaphysical CPR.

theRangers, thanks to the magic of boardroom séances, dodgy business necromancy and the sort of legal contortions that make chiropractors wince, came ‘back’ like Trigger’s broom or Frankenstein’s monster, sewn together, missing a few bolts, but insisting loudly that it was the same creature all along.

Boavista fans now stare into the abyss and wonder why they weren’t allowed that same luxury.

But deep down, they know the truth, Scotland bent its rules for one corpse and one corpse only and Portugal doesn’t do séances.

Boavista are dead. Rangers died too — until a brotherhood of nervous men decided they couldn’t afford the ghost.

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