THE Celtic View continues its look at our 21 greatest goalscorers, which includes our current No.9, Leigh Griffiths, looking briefly at the careers of the men occupying the top scoring spots.

Today we take a look at Charlie Nicholas, a player who burst on to the scene in the early 1980s, and over two spells with the club, netted an impressive 125 goals.

Charlie Nicholas
Appearances: 129
Goals: 125
Debut: Kilmarnock 0-3 Celtic; 16/08/1980

Making his debut exactly 61 years to the day that the player one above him in the top 20 Celtic scorers, Tommy McInally at No.14, Charlie Nicholas may not have got the ball rolling quite so quickly as his predecessor, but he was unlucky not to get off the mark.

Nicholas made his Celtic debut at 18-year-old substitute in a 3-0 league win over Kilmarnock, when he hit the post twice, and a couple of games later, again from the bench, the striker got his first two goals in a 6-1 win over Stirling Albion – the first of many. He didn’t pick up the nickname ‘Charles De Goal’ for nothing.

Nicholas scored 28 goals in 45 games in his debut season before a leg-break midway through his second term curtailed his tally to six goals in 14 games. He then returned in 1982/83 and scored for fun throughout the term – so much so that he fell just short of the 50-goal tally.

Like the aforementioned McInally, Nicholas is one of a clutch of players who had two spells with the club and he first left in 1983, before returning in 1990 and went on to score 43 goals in 137 games before moving to Clyde in 1995.

Tomorrow: Dixie Deans

Celtic View celebrates our greatest goalscorers - Charlie Nicholas