Footage shared on social media has shown the moment Aston Villa ultras confronted Celtic supporters ahead of the Champions League tie this evening.
A short video showed pyro set off on Witton Road in Birmingham between Villa Park and the Witton train station where Celtic supporters arrived for the match.
Footage showed Villa ultras holding up flags near the station before flares can be seen thrown between the rival supporters.
29.01.2025, Aston Villa🏴 - Glasgow Celtic🏴, Celtic arrive at train station near Villa Park where Aston Villa are waiting for them, ACAB arrive quickly, click for more here: https://t.co/2KvOUCcpBI pic.twitter.com/YyH0zXcdYt
— Hooligans.cz Official (@hooliganscz1999) January 29, 2025
Police appeared to be on the scene with no direct altercations between the supporters visible beyond the pyro being hurled.
Celtic face Villa in their final league phase match in the revamped Champions League this evening.
Brendan Rodgers' side are already through to the knockout stage of the competition after beating Young Boys last week.
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Celtic will be without Daizen Maeda and Cameron Carter-Vickers for the match tonight. Maeda misses out after being served a two-match ban with Carter-Vickers nursing an injury.
Long-term absentee, James Forrest will remain sidelined for the league phase contest in Birmingham.
Ahead of the match, Rodgers said: "Yeah, it's a brilliant game.
"Listen, for us, it's a great achievement to be in the top 24, I think, if you look at the economics of it all and at this level. For the players, they've been fantastic, they've stayed with the idea, they've worked very, very hard and what we set out to do, which was to firstly arrive in the play-offs, the players have done that, so it's great.
"But our job's not complete in this series of eight games, we come here to a great venue against a fantastic team, but we want to come and play to the level that we know we can do, so we're really looking forward to it."
