Celtic to fans: Please remember to bathe
Few sports bring people together like football. But be warned: If you stink, even camaraderie among fellow fans isn't enough to make you welcome.
Celtic are proof of this.
The Scottish giants recently wrote a letter to their season ticket holders, reminding them to wash properly before heading to the stadium.
The reason? The club had received complaints about a particularly smelly fan whose foul odour was disrupting his/her fellow supporters' match-day experience, The Independent said.
The letter reads:
"Dear supporter, we have been contacted recently by fans within the section regarding personal hygiene issues which are impacting on the enjoyments of some supporters.
"We would therefore like to ask everyone to please ensure that the enjoyment of your fellow supporters is not impacted and that everyone within the area maintains an acceptable standard of personal hygiene."
Some sceptical supporters wondered if they were being pranked.
But Celtic supporter liaison officer John Paul Taylor, whose name appeared to have signed off on the letter, seemed to confirm the letter's authenticity on Twitter.
Shortly after, Taylor deleted the post.
If you found Celtic's red card for body odour amusing, check out five more items that football managers have banned:
1) MUSHROOMS
We're not talking about narcotic ones.
A few months into the job in 2008, Giovanni Trapattoni was astounded by the amount of mushrooms that Ireland's national players consumed on match days.
The legendary Italian coach said he was stunned into silence for a few seconds.
But he quickly recovered and decreed that fungi were a no-go for matchday breakfasts and dinners.
2) CHIPS
While Trapattoni's crusade against mushroom didn't make a lot of sense, David Moyes had a pretty good rationale for axing chips (or fries, as we call them here) at Manchester United.
After he was sacked from the post, the former Everton boss confirmed what Rio Ferdinand's autobiography said about the ban.
He had done so because a few Red Devils were overweight.
The decision proved to be extremely unpopular among United's playing staff.
Once Moyes' departure was confirmed, it didn't take long before Ferdinand asked interim player-manager Ryan Giggs to reinstate the potato snack.
3) COLOURED BOOTS
Sticking with Manchester United, Moyes' predecessor Sir Alex Ferguson had a reputation for running the club with an iron fist.
Among the edicts that the strict disciplinarian dished out: No coloured boots for the club's youth players.
But the restriction will not apply once the player broke out of the academy level into the club's first team or reserves.
Still, it certainly reminded United's youngsters of who ruled the roost at Old Trafford.
4) MARS BARS
When Arsene Wenger took over Arsenal in 1996, the Frenchman placed his squad was placed on a strict diet to maximise their health.
That meant getting rid of snacks like Mars bars.
That certainly didn't go down well with the players, who chanted "We want our Mars bars!" on the team bus while travelling to Blackburn.
Happily, Wenger survived the early mutiny and is currently the English Premier League's longest-serving manager.
5) KETCHUP
The tomato condiment is and probably will be a continual sticking point for many a football manager.
Paolo di Canio blamed the sauce (and mayonnaise) for the Sunderland squad's poor fitness when he took over from Martin O'Neill in 2013.
It was also a source of contention at Tottenham Hotspur when Juande Ramos took over in 2007.
When Harry Redknapp was appointed managed after the Spaniard was sacked, legend has it that he placed a bottle of ketchup on his players' table at meal time, prompting the club's upturn in form.
Sources: The Independent, Who Ate All the Pies
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