Neil Lennon applauded his Celtic players for seizing their opportunity as he rested some stars but still saw his team sweep Partick Thistle aside in the League Cup quarter-final.

The holders were 5-0 winners and set up a last-four clash with Hibs but Lennon has made eight changes form the team that beat Kilmarnock 3-1 on Sunday.

Vakoun Issouf Bayo, Tom Rogic, Oliver Ntcham and Scott Sinclair were all on the scoresheet while Jeremie Frimpong was man of the match on his debut.

"I'm delighted," Lennon said. "I just said to the players that I'm so happy with them. We were able to rest a few players and the players who came in excelled.

"On paper these games look easy and we know that they are not. We just asked the players to find a little more second half and they certainly did that.

"There were some exceptional individual performances and it's an excellent win. The most important thing is that we are into the semi-final.

"It was out of necessity with the volume of games that we've been having and have got coming up as well.

"While there's a few bumps and bruises the majority of the squad is very healthy and you could see what it meant to some of them to play tonight. For the likes of Tom Rogic it's his first 90 minutes in some time and from the work behind the scenes you could see he got stronger and looked like he enjoyed himself. Olivier Ntcham had a great game and Jonny Hayes is looking more accomplished.

"It should be a seamless transition for me to make changes. We're in a good place at the moment and that's where you want to be with a club as big as this."

And Lennon was also impressed with Sinclair, who had fallen out of the first team picture.

"He's still very much part of the squad," Lennon said. "He's not a sulker and we got a good reaction from Scott.

"His body language in training is improving all the time. He did what he does best, came on, scored a goal and looked fit and strong."