Posted by Sabrina B. @gametimegirl

The four parcel bombs sent to Celtic manager Neil Lennon and two prominent supporters of the Glasgow club were live devices that could have caused “significant harm,” police said Wednesday.

The devices were sent in the weeks after a tumultuous match between Celtic and fierce Glasgow rival Rangers, two clubs with a history of sectarian conflict. The packages were intercepted before reaching their targets and did not explode.

Detective chief superintendent John Mitchell of Strathclyde police said, after initial suspicion that the packages may have been a hoax, forensic tests showed they were “viable devices.”

“They were definitely capable of causing significant harm and injury to individuals if they had opened them,” he said.

While police didn’t discuss the motive behind the mail bombs, sectarian tensions in Northern Ireland and Glasgow are regularly played out between Celtic fans, who are mostly Catholic, and Rangers fans, who are mostly Protestant.

The first parcel bomb targeting Lennon, a Catholic from Northern Ireland, was found on March 4 and a second was intercepted at a sorting office outside Glasgow on March 26.

Another package destined for Celtic-supporting Scottish lawmaker Trish Godman was intercepted at her constituency office two days later. A fourth package destined for Paul McBride, a lawyer who has represented Lennon, was intercepted earlier this week.

Celtic chief executive Peter Lawwell condemned the “repeated threats and intimidation.”

“It is an intolerable state of affairs which must end,” he said. “Celtic, from our inception, has been a club open to all. We enjoy friendship and respect throughout the world yet, here in Scotland, we are caught up in these vile events.”

-AP