The Thistle Archive

Celtic routed 10-man Partick Thistle to seal their place in the semi-finals of the Scottish League Cup. John Guidetti once again demonstrated why moves are afoot to sign him on a permanent basis with a hat-trick. Emilio Izaguirre grabbed his first Celtic goal in four years after Guidetti's opener was followed by Stuart Bannigan's red card for Thistle. And Leigh Griffiths leapt off the bench to score a brace and complete the scoring. Celtic join Aberdeen, Dundee United and Rangers in Saturday's semi-final draw. Thistle's last win at Celtic Park was in 1992 and their last League Cup success over Celtic was their famous 4-1 final triumph under Davie McParland in 1971. And the visitors settled well with Bannigan, Nathan Eccleston and James Craigen all flashing efforts wide of the target. But as the first half progressed, Celtic grew into the game and took the lead on the half-hour after Guidetti had been hauled down by Abdul Osman. The Swede - on loan at Celtic from Manchester City - stroked the free-kick home to give the favourites the lead. On Halloween week, the horror was just beginning for the Maryhill men. Bannigan was shown a straight red card by referee Kevin Clancy for thumping into Guidetti who was left writhing in agony. Half-time arrived but it was not long before the turkey-shoot got underway. Izaguirre's goal drought was ended as he thumped home a Stokes flick-on just after the break. Guidetti grabbed another from a superb arching free-kick before completing his treble from the penalty spot, the Swede having been fouled. As the carnage unfolded, Griffiths arrived on the scene and headed an Izaguirre cross past Scott Fox. Fox then drove a clearance off the former Hibernian forward and it spun into the far corner for Celtic's sixth. Mercifully for the Jags, with half-an-hour still to play, the damage did not get worse. What will please manager Ronny Deila will be the nature of the performance in the closing stages as Celtic did not drop down into cruise control, with substitute Stefan Scepovic almost squirming an effort home. But it stayed at six and Celtic's recent woes in the tournament look to be at an end. Celtic manager Ronny Deila: "The second half was fantastic. We created a lot of chances and we opened them up. "They went down to 10 men and it was difficult for Partick Thistle, but he deserved the red card, so that's not our fault. We were professional, we worked hard for 90 minutes and we created chances and a lot of good moments in the second half. We have five clean sheets in nine games now, so defensively it's good and offensively we still have to get things quicker, but I think we are going the right way." Partick Thistle manager Alan Archibald: "Very disappointing. "Game of two halves, the sending off changes things totally. There was nothing in the game up until the [first] free-kick [goal]. We were very disappointed by the foul that led to it because we didn't think it was a foul. I didn't think Stuart had to make the challenge. It was a wee bit reckless. The game totally changes on that. We lost poor goals. The lads felt a bit sorry for themselves and that led to a couple of the soft goals that we lost. They've got to learn from it."

bbc.com

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