Wednesday 25 September 2019 23:29, UK
Celtic and Rangers made it into the semi-finals of the Scottish League Cup on Wednesday, while Hearts and Hibernian joined them with penalty shoot-out victories.
Celtic showed their strength in depth as they dismissed Partick Thistle 5-0 in their Scottish League Cup quarter-final clash at Celtic Park.
Ivorian striker Vakoun Issouf Bayo, one of eight changes made by Hoops boss Neil Lennon, opened the scoring for the holders with a close-range header in the 15th minute and Ian McCall, in his first game in charge of the Maryhill men since returning to lead the team for a second time on Monday, watched Tom Rogic add a second within a minute of the restart.
Two goals in six minutes from midfielder Olivier Ntcham and a strike in the 77th minute from substitute Scott Sinclair confirmed that the treble-treble winners have the squad to continue their success this season.
McCall has a more winnable Ladbrokes Premiership game at the weekend against Inverness, where he will be looking to take the Jags - currently bottom - away from the danger area, although he will have to get this runaround quickly out the system.
Celtic will now play Hibernian in the semi-finals.
An early deflected goal from Glen Kamara proved enough to send Rangers past Livingston and into the Scottish League Cup semi-finals.
Rangers were far from comfortable at the Tony Macaroni Arena with their defence given plenty of trouble from the hosts.
But Livingston goalkeeper Matija Sarkic produced some good saves and Steven Gerrard's men got a firmer grip of the game in the final 20 minutes.
They had looked set for a more comfortable evening when Kamara took advantage of Nicky Devlin's poor clearance to send a left-footed shot in off the full-back from 18 yards inside five minutes.
Rangers will now play Hearts in the semi-finals.
Goalkeeper Chris Maxwell was the shoot-out hero as Hibernian booked their place in the semi-finals after beating Kilmarnock on penalties at Rugby Park.
A cagey first period yielded few chances and, while there was a noticeable improvement in the second period, neither team could break the deadlock inside 90 minutes and extra-time was required.
Hibs were reduced to 10 men in the 120th minute when Ryan Porteous was given his marching orders and the tie had to be decided by a shoot-out after the extra period finished goalless.
The shoot-out was decided when Niko Hamalainen's penalty was saved by Maxwell, handing Hibs a 5-4 victory.
Sam Cosgrove converted two spot-kicks in normal-time before missing in the decisive penalty shoot-out as Hearts progressed at the expense of Aberdeen.
Cosgrove netted a double from the spot in the first half after Christophe Berra and Loic Damour had committed clumsy fouls.
However, strikes from Steven MacLean and an injury-time leveller from Craig Halkett sent the clash into extra-time, during which Dons attacker Niall McGinn struck the post.
But it was the Jambos who would progress in a fraught shoot-out, with Cosgrove and McGinn blasting woefully over the bar and Joel Pereira saving Bruce Anderson's kick.
