Celtic enjoyed a relatively straightforward victory in the Scottish Premier League on Saturday, beating St Johnstone 3-0 at McDiarmid Park.
The Bhoys scraped a 3-2 victory at the same venue in the Co-operative Insurance Cup during the week, but had much less trouble in the league fixture, as two goals from Niall McGinn and a strike from Emilio Izaguirre secured the win.
Celtic opened the scoring with just over a minute gone, as McGinn drilled home a rebound after Anthony Stokes’ shot had been parried by Graeme Smith, following Ki Sung-Yueng’s free-kick.
Ki almost put Celtic two up a few minutes later, striking a post after being found by an excellent touch from Stokes.
The visitors continued to dominate, and Stokes should have scored on 20 minutes, heading over following a ball into the home box from Mark Wilson.
Celtic dominated almost all of the first half and deservedly went further ahead a few minutes before the break, when Izaguirre intercepted a pass from Steven Milne and slipped the ball under goalkeeper Graeme Smith.
Following a good start to the second half from Celtic, St Johnstone had their best period of the game, as a Jennison Myrie-Williams produced a save from Fraser Forster, with Marcus Haber unable to finish from the rebound.
The hosts enjoyed plenty of possession in the second 45 minutes, but rarely threatened the Bhoys’ two-goal lead, and Celtic turned the screw late on.
Georgios Samaras was unable to keep his balance when well-placed to make it 3-0, but the job was completed with two minutes of regulation time to go, as a pull-back from Cha Du-Ri found McGinn, who horribly mishit a shot that crept into the corner of the net.