Reo Hatate’s penalty and second-half goals from Matt O’Riley and Daizen Maeda helped Celtic to a 3-0 win at Livingston despite losing Joe Hart to a first-half red card.
The former England goalkeeper fouled Mohammed Sangare just outside the penalty box and was sent off by referee John Beaton. That left Brendan Rodgers’ side to play the final hour with just 10 men, but they never looked in any real danger as Livingston failed to take advantage of their numerical supremacy.
Their manager David Martindale had made two changes from the team that had drawn 1-1 with Ross County the previous weekend. In came Sangare and Scott Pittman, replacing Mikey Devlin and Stephen Kelly. There was only one change to the Celtic starting line-up from their Champions League loss to Feyenoord and it was a surprising one, James Forrest handed his first start since January as Luis Palma dropped out.
The first chance came for Celtic but Hatate’s low dribbler lacked the power to trouble Shamal George in the home goal. Livingston replied with a fierce Bruce Anderson drive that Hart did well to parry, with Callum McGregor booting Pittman’s rebound effort off the line.
The opening goal, however, came at the other end after 14 minutes. Luiyi de Lucas needlessly brought down Hatate and Beaton immediately awarded the penalty. Hatate chose to take it himself and his effort squeezed under George’s body to give Celtic the lead. The goalkeeper was unfortunate there but proved his worth shortly after as he rushed out to block Maeda’s shot from close range.
The next piece of drama unfolded at the other. Sangare reached James Penrice’s ball ahead of Hart, the goalkeeper bringing him down clumsily on the edge of the box. Beaton flashed a red card and VAR did not change the decision, reducing Celtic to 10 men for the remainder of the match. Forrest was sacrificed to allow Scott Bain to come on. Penrice took the resultant free-kick but curled it into the side netting before Ayo Obileye had a dig from distance that Bain stopped well.
Celtic’s Joe Hart leaves the pitch. Photograph: Jeff Holmes/PA
Livingston began the second half looking to capitalise on their extra man, but instead found themselves further behind less than three minutes later. Maeda failed to turn in Kyogo Furuhashi’s cross from close range but O’Riley bailed him out by lashing in the rebound.
Joel Nouble then tried to lob Bain after a mistake by the substitute goalkeeper but his attempt drifted just over the crossbar as Livi failed to mount any kind of response. Instead there was still time for Celtic to claim a third in injury time with Maeda finishing well from distance.
