DANNY ROHL’S team twice had the advantage over Celtic in their Scottish Cup quarter-final – and couldn’t make it count on either occasion.
First up, the Ibrox side were drawn to play the last-eight encounter at their home ground of Ibrox.
Secondly, with the tie concluding scoreless after two frantic hours, penalty-kicks were required to separate the teams.
Liam Scales, skipper for the day in place of the injured Callum McGregor, faced the toss of the coin with James Tavernier to see which end the spot-kicks would be taken.
THIRD TIME LUCKY…Reo Hatate forces in Celtic’s equaliser in the 2-2 draw at Ibrox after twice being denied by Jack Butland.
The Republic of Ireland international defender hoped for the Broomloan Road part of the stadium which, of course, housed 7, 500 Hoops fans. As luck would have it, Scales lost out and the visitors would have to shoot in at the hostile Copland Road.
It was a time for strong characters to step up in face of such intimidation, but Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Auston Trusty, Reo Hatate and Tomas Cvancara didn’t flinch as they whipped four expertly-taken efforts behind Jack Butland to give the Hoops a 4-2 spot-kick triumph.
O’Neill saluted the composure of the penalty-takers – especially his Japanese midfielder.
The previous weekend, Hatate had seen Butland save his spot-kick, but still managed to squeeze in his team’s equalising goal in the 2-2 draw at the third attempt.
O’Neill said: “Once I saw that Reo was down as one of the five penalty-takers, I might have been a bit concerned.
“It didn’t take him three attempts to put it in. He wanted to take the penalty.
EASY AS ONE, TWO, THREE…Reo Hatate after netting Celtic’s third penalty-kick.
“The most important thing, I think, about these things is that five of them wanted to take the penalties. So that’s great. I must admit that they took them brilliantly.”
The interim manager, speaking to The Scotsman, added: “They were obviously under a lot of pressure to do it. So to step up and take that walk for a start…
“You can take penalties in training, which we did, but you can’t really – what shall I say? – you just don’t know what it’s like until you step up and take the penalties.
“It was pleasing to see how well they did it.”
Celtic will now meet St Mirren in the semi-final at Hampden on the weekend of April 18/19.
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