John Fallon

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John Fallon (born Cambuslang, 1940) was a goalkeeper for Celtic F.C., who was a member of the famous Lisbon Lions of 1967.

Fallon was taken on as a junior by Celtic, and soon was promoted to cover for the famous eccentric keeper Frank Haffey. Fallon played his first full game for the Celtic first team in 1959 and replaced Haffey completely in 1963.

However, in spite of a successful European campaign in 1964, he lost his place as first choice keeper to the more experienced Ronnie Simpson.

He good-naturedly understudied Simpson for the next couple of years, playing only occasionally against "easy opponents." When interviewed, he said that it was more nerve-racking sitting on the bench as substitute than it was being on the field.

[edit] Lisbon Lions

In the European Cup final of 1967, played in Lisbon, between Celtic and Inter Milan, Fallon, who, as goalkeeper, was the only substitute allowed at the time, and sat out the entire match. He is thus the only Lisbon Lions player not to have actually played. Some people leave him out of the Lisbon Lions entirely.

After the European triumph, Celtic reached the final of the World Club Cup the same year. They were in a two-leg final against Racing Club of Argentina. While warming up for the second leg, a brick (Sir Robert Kelly says it was a "flat iron bar") thrown or catapulted by a member of the crowd, struck Simpson on the head. With Simpson unable to play as a result, Fallon was called on to keep goal in a bad-tempered second leg, and an even more bad-tempered replay. Although Celtic lost the return leg, and the subsequent play-off in Uruguay, amid accusations of extreme foul play from the Racing players (an accusation later backed by UEFA), Fallon distinguished himself with a string of saves which caused one commentator to remark: "If that's the reserve keeper, what must the other guy be like?" According to Sir Robert Kelly in his book Celtic, when Celtic tried to get the second leg declared void because of the Simpson incident, Racing Club used Fallon's heroic performance as their counter argument, and the result stood.

[edit] First choice again

After Simpson's retirement, Fallon took over as first choice at Celtic, but lost his place to Evan Williams owing to a long illness, sitting out another European Cup Final in 1970.

He moved to Motherwell in 1972, and moved on to Greenock Morton, and retired from active play shortly after.

Fallon never played for Scotland, and will never be regarded as one of their greatest keepers. But he is to date the only Scottish keeper to have played in two World Club Cup final matches.