Celtic star Arne Engels breaks silence on being struck by coin at Ibrox as he reveals ‘I was lucky it wasn’t my eye’
The young Belgian had to receive treatment after being hit just an inch above his eye.
Engels, 21, said: “It was on my eyebrow, so it was really close to my eye. I was lucky that it was not on my eye.
“Of course, in the beginning, your first reaction is feeling if everything is OK, or is there blood or something.
“I did that, then it was OK for me. Then I stood up and just moved on.Inside Morelos’ Rangers transfer as Colombian was overweight day he signed
“But throwing things or doing stuff like that is not part of football for me. Everybody agrees with that.
“It was really not nice, but you need to move on.
“It’s a shock when something gets thrown at your head, and after that it was sore.
“But you need to still play and you need to perform.
“I didn’t speak to anyone from Rangers afterwards, but I did talk to the police who said there would be an investigation to find out who did it.
“Something like that has never happened to me before.
“I’ve seen fireworks on the pitch or beer spilling over players and stuff like that.
“It’s never nice to see a player get hit, even if it’s a beer or anything like this.
“It’s not good to see because it sometimes comes from so high in the stands, and it gets with such a speed on to your head and then it can cause real damage to your head.”
Engels was meant to start against Gers, but fell ill on the morning of the game and was named as a sub at Ibrox instead.
He added: “In the morning I threw up my breakfast, so that was not really nice.
“I didn’t have a nice feeling in my stomach for the whole day actually.
“But I wanted to be there for the team in the end.”
Engels has also revealed how his new team-mates have helped him adapt to life at the Hoops — including a Christmas trip to the World Darts Championships at the Ally Pally.
The midfielder is just gutted they didn’t go in fancy-dress costumes.
Engels said: “I asked myself the same thing. I wanted to be dressed up!
“But no, we didn’t really have a lot of time to do that.
“However it was really nice to be there with the team and with all the boys.”
Greg Taylor helped organise the trip to the darts, and Engels insists he is desperate for the left-back to sign a new deal.
Asked what the defender brings to the team, he added: “I will say that it’s a lot.
“First of all, he’s a lovely guy. I’m here now for five months maybe and I really love Greg, how he behaves here, how he is with everybody here inside of the building.
“Second of all, he has so many qualities. You see it every time in training, but especially in the games.
“Greg is always performing on the highest level. That’s not just for one day, he’s doing it every time.
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