Hibernian 0-2 Celtic: Lennon lauds 'Celtic greats' Brown & Forrest
- Published
Scott Brown and James Forrest are Celtic greats
"Two Celtic greats" made the difference in Saturday's Scottish Cup quarter-final win over Hibernian, said manager Neil Lennon.
James Forrest and Scott Brown scored the goals as Lennon returned to former club Hibs to claim a 2-0 win.
The tournament holders will find out who they will face in the semi-final on Monday evening.
"Pivotal to me," said Lennon of Forrest and Brown after the victory at Easter Road.
"And they've been pivotal to Ronny Deila and they've been pivotal to Brendan Rodgers. They're just really, really good players, as is Mikael Lustig, as is Dedryck Boyata. I'll go through the whole team.
"The second half was outstanding. They were magnificent. Real great control, two magnificent goals and it could've been more.
"[Assistant] John [Kennedy] made a few alterations at half-time with the boys and getting Jamesy in that number 10 position. We know he can break the lines and it was an outstanding first goal and then you've got Brown, who just keeps going, keeps going, scores another cracker."
Both Brown and Forrest played under Lennon the first time he was Celtic boss between 2010 and 2014, with the Northern Irishman returning to the job this week following Rodgers' departure to Leicester City.
"It's rolling back to 2010," said Lennon, who also oversaw Wednesday's 2-1 Scottish Premiership win at Hearts.
"They're two Celtic greats, really. Brown's just an outstanding player, outstanding captain and Forrest is a mercurial talent."
Glass bottle thrown at Scott Sinclair during Celtic's 2-0 win over Hibs
'Hibs just fell short'
It was a first defeat as Hibs head coach for Lennon's successor Heckingbottom, who described the match as a "step too far".
"We can take lots of positives out the game for the work-rate, the organisation," he told BBC Scotland. "We got in really good situations but we lacked the quality in this particular game.
"They played well and when they play you're going to find it really difficult but you can't accept that you've got to have them on an off day just to beat them.
"We want to keep working and getting to the point where we can give them a really tough game regardless. I think we gave them a tough game but we didn't hurt them. They had their moments of quality and we didn't. We did in some things but didn't quite have enough. We just fell short."