Super Caley go ballistic, Celtic are atrocious

The match was initially due to take place on Saturday 29 January, but was called off an hour before kickoff due to storm damage to the roof of the newly built Lisbon Lions Stand – it was rescheduled for 10 days later. Barry Wilson scored the opening goal for Inverness with a 12th-minute header, before the score was levelled soon afterwards by Mark Burchill. In the 24th minute, Inverness retook the lead when an off-target header from Bobby Mann was deflected past goalkeeper Jonathan Gould by Ľubomír Moravčík.

Reports have stated that during the half time interval, Celtic's Mark Viduka threw his boots into the changing room bin and refused to come out for the second half, after an altercation with assistant coach, Eric Black.^[3] Viduka was replaced by Ian Wright, in what was the Englishman's penultimate appearance before being transferred to Burnley a fortnight later.^[4]

In the 56th minute, Barry Wilson was fouled in the box by Regi Blinker, with Paul Sheerin scoring the subsequent penalty to give the visitors a 3–1 lead which they held until the final whistle.

The shock result made national headlines and news spread across the globe,^[5] with The Sun's headline "Super Caley go Ballistic, Celtic are Atrocious" becoming the most famous;^[6] it is still widely regarded as one of the most famous sporting headlines of all time.^[7][8] The phrase, a play on the Mary Poppins song Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, is brought up any time the clubs face each other, particularly in the cups.

Immediately after the match, crowds of Celtic fans gathered outside the main stand of Parkhead calling for the dismissal of head coach John Barnes. Two days later Barnes was sacked, with director of football Kenny Dalglish taking over for the remainder of the season (winning the League Cup) before being replaced by Martin O'Neill, an appointment which heralded a successful period for the club of three league championships and four cup wins in the following five seasons as well as reaching the 2003 UEFA Cup final.

Inverness were given cases of beer by the Celtic officials for the bus journey home, and the money received from the game helped to stabilise the club; they were eventually promoted to the top division in 2004. In the following round of the Scottish Cup, they were drawn at home against eventual finalists Aberdeen, going ahead in the 50th minute through Bobby Mann, before Cato Guntveit equalised in the 80th minute^[9] to take the game to a replay at Pittodrie, where Aberdeen won 1–0 courtesy of a goal from Arild Stavrum.

Three years later, both sides met in the 2002–03 Scottish Cup quarter-final, this time at a packed Caledonian Stadium, where Dennis Wyness scored the only goal to give Inverness another unlikely win.^[10] Caley went on to lose 1–0 to Dundee at Hampden Park in the semi-finals.