Celtic rallied to see off a spirited Livingston outfit at Parkhead to progress to the last four of the Scottish Cup earlier today.
Daizen Maeda netted a double inside 22 minutes, sandwiched either side of a Daniel MacKay strike, which set the tone for a day where the Bhoys were ruthless in attack albeit shaky in defence.
Livingston striker Tete Yengi made the most of Matt O’Riley’s lapse of concentration early in the second half. He held off his attempt to reclaim the ball before sweeping a curling shot by Joe Hart to level the scoring at 2-2.
Hart was called upon three minutes later to deny Michael Nottingham as Celtic continued to live dangerously; however, we also had our chances to put the game beyond doubt earlier than we did.
In the end, Maeda was the hero for the Bhoys, tapping home from close range four minutes from time following some excellent approach play from Alistair Johnston and Tomoki Iwata.
To round off, Kyogo Furuhashi slotted by Michael McGovern in stoppage time to seal a richly deserved 4-2 victory. The Bhoys will now patiently await the outcome of the semi-final draw tomorrow evening.
Aberdeen and Rangers have already booked their place at Hampden; meanwhile, Greenock Morton and Heart of Midlothian battle it out for the last remaining slot before the draw takes place live on BBC Scotland after their match is concluded.
Brendan Rodgers opens up on ‘disruption’ before Celtic victory
Brendan Rodgers had to make a couple of enforced changes before his side’s victory over Livingston, including Stephen Welsh’s last-minute call-up to replace Cameron Carter-Vickers, who was taken out of the firing line as a precaution.
Nicolas Kuhn was also drafted in for the suspended Hyunjun Yang and went on to put in an impressive display on the right flank.
Speaking post-match, Rodgers also revealed that Matt O’Riley is still not fully recovered from his recent illness.
He stated [Cited via The Herald]: “We will go into the remaining games in the league and Scottish Cup with the aim of performing well – because I believe when we perform to our highest level, we have a great chance of winning games. But if you can’t quite get to that level, for whatever reason, you still have to win.
“The players deserve credit for that. Some of them haven’t played a lot. Matt O’Riley wasn’t well all week, Stephen Welsh came in at the last minute, Nicolas (Kuhn) coming in after not featuring. There was a little bit of disruption there, but the guys got the job done in the end.”
Celtic did well to rise to the occasion today against Livingston, taking into account that several of our star men weren’t available to feature.
Cup football is an entirely different kettle of fish from league duty, and David Martindale’s men took the shackles off a bit more than usual, given the one-off nature of the knockout tie.
Nevertheless, reaching the Scottish Cup semi-final is no mean feat for the Hoops, who have the week to recover ahead of facing St Johnstone at home next Saturday.
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