Few controversies in Scottish football resurface with the persistence of accusations tied to sectarian singing. Every few months, it seems, some new piece of old footage, some fresh viral clip, or some contested allegation involving a manager, player, or club official reignites a debate that has never really been settled — not because the underlying facts are unclear, but because the issue sits at the intersection of a genuine, longstanding social divide, a fierce sporting rivalry, and a media and fan ecosystem that often has clear incentives to amplify claims involving the “other side.” Understanding why this keeps happening requires understanding both the specific historical incidents that have shaped the conversation, and the broader social context in which Scottish football, and particularly the Old Firm rivalry, continues to operate.
To understand why sectarian singing remains such a combustible issue in Scottish football specifically, it helps to understand the historical roots of the Celtic-Rangers rivalry itself. Celtic was founded in 1888 by Irish Marist Brother Walfrid, explicitly with the aim of raising funds for impoverished Irish Catholic immigrant communities in Glasgow’s East End. Rangers, founded slightly earlier, developed over subsequent decades into a club closely associated with the city’s Protestant, unionist population — a divide that hardened over the twentieth century, exacerbated at various points by explicit or informal sectarian hiring and signing practices, most notoriously Rangers’ long-standing, only formally abandoned policy against signing openly Catholic players, which persisted in various forms until Mo Johnston’s controversial move to the club in 1989.
That history means the rivalry between the two clubs has never been purely sporting. It has functioned, for well over a century, as one of the most visible expressions of a broader sectarian divide rooted in Irish immigration, religious identity, and political allegiance — a divide that predates both clubs and extends well beyond football into housing patterns, employment history, and community identity across Glasgow and the west of Scotland more broadly. Songs, chants, and symbols connected to that history — whether explicitly Protestant loyalist material sung by sections of the Rangers support, or songs referencing Irish republicanism sometimes sung by sections of the Celtic support — have remained a persistent, if periodically suppressed, feature of matchday atmosphere at Old Firm fixtures and beyond.
If there’s one incident that serves as the benchmark against which subsequent controversies tend to be measured, it’s the case of Donald Findlay QC. Findlay was, at the time, one of Scotland’s most prominent criminal defence lawyers, a former Rector of the University of St Andrews, a leading figure in the Scottish Conservative Party, and — critically for this story — vice-chairman of Rangers Football Club throughout much of the 1990s.
In late May 1999, Rangers defeated Celtic in the Scottish Cup final. That evening, at a celebratory function held at Ibrox, Findlay was filmed leading a crowd in a rendition of several songs closely associated with Protestant loyalist and sectarian tradition, including “The Sash” (an Orange Order anthem commemorating William of Orange’s victory at the Battle of the Boyne), “Derry’s Walls,” and, notably, “The Billy Boys” — a song whose lyrics contain an explicit, unambiguous reference to being “up to our necks in Fenian blood,” among other openly sectarian anti-Catholic content.
The footage was published by the Daily Record on 1 June 1999, and the fallout was swift. Within days, Findlay had resigned from his position on Rangers’ board, issuing a statement acknowledging that his conduct represented “a serious misjudgment” and was “not acceptable,” and offering an unreserved apology for any offence caused. The incident made international headlines at the time, with outlets including the Irish Times covering the resignation as a significant moment in Scotland’s ongoing, often uncomfortable reckoning with sectarian division connected to its national sport. Rangers themselves, in the aftermath, were forced to publicly reaffirm efforts to move the club beyond its historical sectarian associations — efforts that, even at the time, were met with considerable skepticism from critics who viewed the episode as exposing the limits of the club’s public commitments to inclusivity.
Given how frequently it recurs in these controversies, it’s worth understanding the specific history of “The Billy Boys” itself, since it has become something of a recurring flashpoint distinct from the broader catalogue of contested Old Firm-adjacent songs. The song originated in the 1920s as the signature anthem of a Glasgow razor gang led by a man named Billy Fullerton, operating in the sectarian gang culture that characterised parts of interwar Glasgow. Following efforts by Chief Constable Percy Sillitoe to break up Glasgow’s razor gangs, and as many young Protestant men in the city gravitated toward the Orange Order rather than remaining in street gangs, Rangers supporters continued to sing “Billy Boys” in tribute to Fullerton, who retained a prominent position within Glasgow’s Protestant community even after his gang had effectively disbanded.
The Orange Order subsequently adopted and adapted the song for use during Orange walks, altering some lyrics to reference King William III rather than Fullerton directly, while Rangers supporters continued to sing versions of the song, including the “Fenian blood” lyric, at matches for decades afterward. In more recent years, some defenders of the song have attempted to reframe it as directed at Irish republicanism specifically rather than at Catholics as a religious group — an argument disputed by critics who point to the song’s explicit historical content and its clear association with anti-Catholic sentiment rather than any specifically political position on Irish constitutional questions.
The Findlay case, while the most consequential, is far from the only documented instance of sectarian singing connected to Rangers specifically resurfacing in public controversy over the years. Former Rangers midfielder Ian Durrant, a player closely associated with the club’s successful teams of the late 1980s and 1990s, was filmed in October 2018 using explicitly anti-Catholic language at a Rangers supporters’ dinner event in Bothwell, attended by a number of other former players. That incident carried particular weight given that Durrant had already been fined in a Scottish court back in 1989 — decades earlier — for singing sectarian songs and committing a breach of the peace, suggesting a pattern rather than an isolated lapse
Findlay himself faced renewed scrutiny well beyond his initial 1999 resignation. In 2007, he was reported to the Faculty of Advocates over allegedly sectarian jokes told at a separate Rangers supporters’ club function — one reportedly involving mock pipe-smoking and coughing in apparent reference to a nun, and another referencing the Pope. Findlay disputed that the jokes were genuinely offensive and argued they didn’t meet the threshold for professional misconduct, invoking free expression protections; a subsequent tribunal ultimately cleared him, finding insufficient evidence to support disciplinary action, though the episode again placed Scotland’s entrenched sectarian divisions squarely in the public conversation.
It’s worth noting that these controversies, while concentrated in this account around incidents connected to Rangers given the specific claims currently circulating about Derek McInnes, are not confined to one side of the rivalry. Celtic’s own supporters have periodically faced scrutiny and sanction over chants referencing Irish republican paramilitary groups, and songs sung by sections of both fanbases have, at various points, drawn condemnation, investigation, or banning orders from either club, the Scottish FA, or Polic
Scotland has, at various points, attempted to address sectarian conduct connected to football through formal legislative and institutional mechanisms, with mixed success. The Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Act, introduced in 2012, specifically targeted sectarian singing and related conduct at football matches, making certain behaviour a specific criminal offence rather than relying solely on general breach-of-the-peace legislation. The law proved deeply controversial from the outset, criticised by civil liberties campaigners, football supporters’ groups, and legal academics as poorly drafted, difficult to enforce consistently, and potentially in conflict with free expression protections. It was ultimately repealed in 2018, following a vote in the Scottish Parliament, after a five-year period during which prosecutions under the act were relatively rare and its practical impact on actually reducing sectarian singing at matches was widely questioned.
Beyond formal legislation, both clubs have run their own institutional campaigns aimed at addressing the issue from within their respective fanbases. Celtic’s “Bhoys Against Bigotry” initiative and Rangers’ “Pride Over Prejudice” campaign — later rebranded “Follow With Pride” — both emerged in the early 2000s as attempts to actively discourage sectarian and offensive chanting among supporters. Rangers’ campaign notably included the distribution of a guide, informally nicknamed the “Wee Blue Book,” outlining which songs and chants were considered acceptable and which crossed into offensive or sectarian territory; approximately 50,000 copies were distributed to supporters in August 2007. A cross-club initiative, “Sense Over Sectarianism,” has similarly attempted to address the issue at a broader, non-partisan level, working with both fanbases and wider civic institutions rather than focusing exclusively on either club.
Despite these efforts, sociological research examining religiously aggravated crime in Scotland has suggested that football, while a highly visible flashpoint, is not necessarily the primary driver of sectarian division within Glasgow more broadly. A Crown Office audit covering religiously aggravated crimes between January 2004 and June 2005 found that roughly a third were connected to football in some way — a significant proportion, but one that also indicates the underlying social divide manifests well beyond the specific context of Old Firm matchdays, in housing, employment, and community relations more broadly across the west of Scotland.
One of the most persistent and genuinely difficult dynamics running through these recurring controversies is the frequent accusation — made by supporters and commentators on both sides of the rivalry, depending on the specific incident in question — that condemnation of sectarian conduct is applied selectively rather than consistently, with each side often perceiving media coverage and institutional response as biased against their own club while being comparatively lenient toward the other.
This dynamic isn’t purely hypothetical or a product of modern social media amplification; it has surfaced in genuinely notable public exchanges involving figures directly connected to Scottish football’s institutional life. Derek McInnes himself, during an earlier period managing Aberdeen, became embroiled in exactly this kind of dispute after condemning a section of his own club’s support for singing an offensive chant directed at Rangers player Steven Gerrard following a Scottish Cup win at Ibrox. In doing so, McInnes simultaneously pointed to what he characterised as inconsistency in how such incidents were investigated and publicly addressed, noting that he had personally experienced comparable treatment following an earlier Aberdeen defeat to Celtic at Hampden without seeing equivalent action taken. His explicit argument at the time was that there “can’t be selective reporting” or “selective condemnation” of sectarian and offensive behaviour connected to football — a principle that, notably, applies with equal force regardless of which specific individual, club, or incident is under discussion, including any current allegations circulating about McInnes’s own historical conduct.
That underlying tension — between genuine, well-founded concern about sectarianism as a real and damaging social problem, and its periodic deployment as a rhetorical weapon in ongoing fan rivalries — makes navigating these controversies genuinely difficult for anyone attempting to report on them fairly. Allegations resurface, frequently via old footage recirculated by partisan supporters or fan media outlets aligned with one side of the rivalry, and quickly become entangled in broader, pre-existing arguments about whose club or supporter base has historically received more lenient treatment from journalists, governing bodies, or law enforcement — arguments that, in many cases, predate the specific incident being discussed by years or even decades
Given how emotionally charged and historically loaded these controversies tend to be, the question of verification becomes especially important when assessing any specific new allegation. The Findlay case represents the clearest example of a properly verified, consequential incident: professionally filmed footage, published by a mainstream national newspaper, followed by an explicit admission of wrongdoing and resignation from the individual involved, with the entire sequence of events independently corroborated across multiple contemporary news sources at the time, including international outlets.
By contrast, many allegations that circulate in the current media environment — particularly via partisan fan blogs, social media accounts, and YouTube channels explicitly aligned with one side of the rivalry — lack that same level of independent verification. Footage may be undated, poorly sourced, presented without clear context about when or where it was filmed, or simply asserted as fact by outlets with an obvious institutional interest in damaging the reputation of a rival club’s manager, player, or official. That doesn’t necessarily mean such claims are false, but it does mean they warrant a different, more cautious standard of treatment than a case like Findlay’s, where the evidentiary record was clear, contemporaneous, and ultimately acknowledged by the individual involved hi
Taken together, the recurring nature of these controversies — spanning more than a quarter-century from Findlay’s 1999 resignation through to ongoing disputes in the present day — illustrates a broader truth about sectarianism’s relationship to Scottish football: it is not a problem that has been definitively solved, nor is it likely to be resolved through any single incident, campaign, or piece of legislation. The underlying social divide the rivalry reflects runs far deeper than football itself, rooted in more than a century of religious, political, and community history in Glasgow and the west of Scotland.
What both clubs, football’s governing bodies, and Scottish society more broadly have managed, with varying degrees of success, is a kind of ongoing management of the issue — institutional campaigns, periodic legislative attempts, formal condemnations when incidents are clearly verified, and continued public conversation about where exactly the line falls between contested historical culture and genuinely harmful, discriminatory conduct. That management has neither eliminated the underlying divide nor prevented new controversies from regularly resurfacing, whether through verified historical incidents like Findlay’s, contested and unverified claims circulating through partisan media, or fresh incidents involving current players, managers, and officials.
For as long as the Old Firm rivalry continues to function as one of the most visible expressions of that older social division, it seems reasonable to expect that allegations of sectarian singing and conduct will continue to surface periodically — some genuinely significant and well-documented, others considerably murkier and harder to verify — and that each new incident will likely reignite the same fundamental, unresolved arguments about accountability, consistency, and whether Scottish football has ever fully reckoned with this particular part of its history, or has simply become more practiced at managing its recurring resurfacing in public.
