McCann hopes Celtic can pull in the crowds

21 May 1994

WHEN Celtic and Hearts square off on Sunday for the opening of the first Hamilton Cup, it will be something of a relief for the Scottish-born promoters, Jim Noble and Fergus McCann.

Circumstances have posed numerous hurdles, not least the struggle to gain sanction from the Canadian Soccer Association, who originally put an embargo on international matches for much of the summer in order to protect ticket sales for Canada's national-team games against World Cup opponents.

The four-team tournament -- Aberdeen and Montreal are also here -- is an ambitious project for the promoters.

"A year ago we went to Scotland, met with Lou Macari then Sandy Clark at Hearts," recalls Noble.

"We also went to Ibrox and they told us they may be available next year.

We came home with agreements for three out of four of the teams we approached, which we really didn't expect."

Whether the Hamilton community (population 320,000) embraces this tournament or not will be answered in the next few days.

The disclosure that Celtic are without several key players, mostly due to injuries, has made the organisers nervous.

Aberdeen are without striker Duncan Shearer, who will team up for Scotland on Thursday, as well as four other regulars.

Macari denies concerns that Celtic is treating this as a holiday.

"There is not a player back in Scotland that I could have brought here," he said.

"Unfortunately, we've been hit with the worst injury situation probably any team's been hit with." But he argues that his team will be competitive, despite the fact that the games at Ivor Wynne Stadium will be played on artificial turf.

"We'll have Celtic supporters.

We know the conditions are different to what we're used to.

We've got to get out there and put on a show."

Taken from the Herald