The Road to Lisbon

We did it by playing football. Pure, beautiful, inventive football. May 1967: The summer of love. Anything seems possible. Sex, drugs, rock ‘n’ roll... and football. Celtic FC’s home-grown team travel to Lisbon, to face the mighty Inter Milan in a bid to become champions of Europe. For their manager, Jock Stein, it is the culmination of a long personal journey which began in the darkness of the Lanarkshire coalmines. After years of hardship, despair and rejection, he has created an irresistible attacking force who are out to free European football from the stranglehold of defensive tactics. For Tim, a Celtic fanatic, the road trip to Portugal with his four friends marks a coming of age. Sixties London – and the love of a beautiful woman – is calling him, but can he leave behind his family and friends for a heady new world? The Road to Lisbon intertwines Jock and Tim’s personal accounts of the seven days up to and including that legendary night in the Estádio Nacional. It is about the underdog’s quest for identity against the odds, of hopes and dreams, of self-discovery, courage and of triumph over adversity.