The east End of Glasgow will grind to a halt today as football fans, friends and family prepare to say a last farewell to Celtic legend Jimmy Johnstone who died on Monday after a long battle against motor neurone disease.

Strathclyde police are expecting thousands of fans to line the route as the cortege passes from the St John the Baptist Church in Uddingston to Celtic Park, with the statdium he graced so many times awash with football scarves, shirts and messages proclaiming the talent of one of Scottish football’s greatest ever players.

Johnstone won nine consecutive Scottish league titles with Celtic between 1965 and 1974 and was an integral member of Celtic’s Lisbon Lions team, who beat Inter Milan to become the first British winners of the European Cup in 1967.

He was diagnosed with motor neurone disease in November 2001 and became a fervent campaigner for research into the condition.

As a further mark of respect the St Patrick’s Day committee in New York has given permission to Celtic supporters to hold a minute’s silence in memory of Johnstone when they stop outside St Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue.

This entry was posted on Friday, March 17th, 2006 at 10:10 am and is filed under Celtic. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. Both comments and pings are currently closed.