The Thistle Archive

It was a dream for Tony Watt to play for Celtic, even though he had a one day trial at Rangers at one point and a short trial at Liverpool, but Celtic was always his first love and first pick, and he worked his way to the first team and repaid the club in full. In April 2021, a dream debut for Tony in a 3-0 win over Motherwell shot him into the limelight. He scored a double that day after the team had toiled prior to his substitution on to the field. If anyone doubted him in his early days, then he was to make his mark in the most incredible manner. He had scored around six goals for Celtic up to November 2012, but all of them were whilst playing away. Amazingly, his first goal at Celtic Park was against the highly lauded Barcelona side in the Champions League (what timing) on 7th November 2012. A long ball from Forster saw Watt lose his man, get on the ball, carry on the run, and bury it into the corner of the net to seal a 2-1 win against one of the greatest sides of all time. He had written his name into Celtic folklore, for it was one of the club's finest-ever victories in Europe. Remember that at this point he was not long before playing for Airdrie in the lower tiers and was bought for peanuts. Now, he had just scored the winner against Barcelona in the Champions League. It was a moment never to forget for anyone who witnessed it.

The dilemma was whether the goal v Barcelona gave everyone a distorted impression of his true ability and chances to reach the heights. Scoring a goal like he did was something every football supporter dreams about but that match is not the norm, and the bread and butter in domestic competitions is the first priority. After the great Barca game, his form soon dipped and the goals dried up at Celtic. It was all too much too soon possibly. Tony Watt, for the good of his own career, was sent out on loan to Lierse in Belgium for the 2013-14 season. Better to be on the park playing in competitive football than on the bench. The signings of Balde & Pukki had put him back in the line and he needed experience. Every Celtic supporter wanted him to succeed and come back to Celtic a better player. Tony made a great start to his loan spell at the Belgian side, coming off the bench to score against Kortrikj, but manager Stanley Menzo said he just wasn’t good enough criticising him for being ‘lazy and unfit’ on his arrival. However after a stop and start time, he got into his stride and began scoring goals after confidence finally bedded in. Watt was happy when it was all over, as he and his Lierse manager had repeated spats.

On his return to Celtic in the summer of 2014, it was hoped that Tony would benefit from a fresh start and that he'd now be a more rounded character. Celtic was under new management, Ronnie Deila, and so old squabbles should have been water under the bridge. Tony spoke about commitment and effort at Celtic, and how he was ready for the season ahead. He wasn’t to be given the chance. Standard Liege were mightily impressed with him and made a £1.2m offer which both parties accepted. It seems that the past errors were not forgiven or at least ignored, and the support was lukewarm to the situation. Had we just given away great potential? For a club paying over the odds for often risky projects, Tony Watt would have been an inexpensive addition to keep. Some may complain he had a “Billy Big Shoes” mentality, but he had backed it up often enough on the pitch and he was still young. He was played mostly coming off the bench, which didn’t help him in his development. The problem by that time was that he had now gone through four managers in Scotland and Belgium at both club and international level, and similar complaints arose each time. He admitted to some bad attitudes and that he needed to re-adjust, so that admission was welcome. In any case, he was gone and the Celtic support was left to wonder “What if?”. Tony Watt may have played little for Celtic but he is immortalised with that special goal v Barcelona. That is something he will cherish for the rest of his life. We wished him the best.

The fall from grace was sadly quite swift and cruel for Tony. The hopes for a brilliant career, post-Celtic, were sadly in tatters. He struggled to settle in at a club, and struggled to convert his early form into being a top level goal scorer. However, despite that, he remained very chirpy on his career at the top, and for any critics he was not slow to remind them that what the few great moments of his time at Celtic were still far greater than even that of the long careers of many other players. Many would sacrifice all for even just that one experience he had on scoring that second goal v Barcelona to win in the Champions League at Celtic Park. Whilst still at Celtic, on 21 May 2013, Watt was called up by Gordon Strachan to the senior Scotland squad for the World Cup qualifier in Zagreb against Croatia on 7 June 2013. He did not play, and was subsequently dropped from the Under 21 side by manager Billy Stark, with Stark citing issues with Watt's fitness as the main reason for not selecting him. It was whilst going through a spell of playing for a number of clubs in English football that Watt was again called up (as a Blackburn Rovers player) to the senior Scotland squad in March 2016 for a friendly against Czech Republic, and made his debut in the match on 24 March, a 1–0 win for Scotland, when he came on as a 78th-minute substitute for Ross McCormack. It would prove to be his only full cap.

In the early 2020s, Tony finally settled at Motherwell, becoming a fans favourite before surprisingly moving to Dundee United in late 2021, in what was initially a mostly unsuccessful spell. Things weren’t going well for either of these two clubs in season 2022/23 with both fighting to stave off relegation, and Tony ended up moving on loan to St Mirren for the second half of that season. He returned back to Dundee United, and had a successful season there, scoring 15 goals in season 2023/24, helping them to the second tier title and bringing them back to the Premiership. He would play no part in that subsequent top-flight campaign however, and he was loaned out to Motherwell for the duration of 2024-25, where 1 goal in 30 appearances was a poor return. Following the departure of Brian Graham in the close season of 2025, new Partick Thistle manager Mark Wilson was in the market for a striker and, being a former colleague of Tony's at Celtic Park, was able to persuade him that Firhill would the ideal place to continue his career. A two-year deal was struck in July 2025, delighting both the player and Thistle's head coach:

To secure a player like Tony is a real coup for the club. I played with him briefly when he was a youngster at Celtic and he’s gone on to have a distinguished career since then. He arrives here as a very experienced player who had an excellent season the last time he was playing at this level, and we want to give him the platform to perform like that again.