Dundee were dumped out of the Scottish Cup by Celtic in a disappointingly one-sided fifth round contest at Dens Park.
Early goals at the start of each half, from Leigh Griffiths and Stefan Johansen, did the damage but the scoreline should have been even more emphatic.
And there could be no arguments about which team deserved to progress through to the quarter-finals.
Celtic’s treble hopes are still very much alive, but for Dundee it will be all about the league, and trying to finish in the top six, from now on.
Paul Hartley wasn’t able to field cup-tied duo Alex Harris and Paul Heffernan.
There were three changes to the team which drew with Hamilton last week. Stephen McGinn made his first start, Luka Tankulic also stepped up from the bench, and the boldest call from Hartley was going with young striker Craig Wighton instead of David Clarkson.
Ronny Deila went with 10 of the eleven who saw off Rangers in the League Cup semi-final. The only alteration was James Forrest in for Anthony Stokes.
And it was the man who gave the Hoops an early lead at Hampden who repeated the trick at Dens.
After just seven minutes former Dundee favourite Griffiths found the net with a lovely glancing header after he had timed his near post run to perfection, and Mikael Lustig had been equally accurate with his cross from the right.
It would have been two on 10 minutes but for a fine last-gasp James McPake interception on Johansen as the midfielder had shifted the ball from his left foot to his right in the box.
It was shaping up as a long afternoon for the home team, with Celtic enjoying nearly all of the ball and plenty of chances in the early stages. Scott Brown looked as imperious as he did last Sunday and came close with a low angled left foot shot.
Chances don’t come much better than the one Forrest passed up on 23 minutes.
Not for the first time Dundee coughed up possession in midfield and Celtic players poured forward on the Dark Blues defence. Johansen chose the right option in slipping the ball to Forrest to his left. It should have been a simple finish but he shot straight at Scott Bain.
This let-off sparked some sort of response from Dundee, who hadn’t laid a glove on Celtic up until this point. They won a couple of corners, and from one of them Kostadin Gadzhalov struck his volley well and it narrowly missed Craig Gordon’s left hand post.
It was a brief riposte though and just after the half-hour mark Kris Commons dragged a shot wide from the 18 yard line after a flowing move.
Greg Stewart has been Dundee’s star man this season but he wasn’t going to be their hero in this match, as he had to be substituted on 35 minutes (for Paul McGinn) when he left the pitch holding his back.
There was the familiar sight of Dundee being out-muscled in midfield when Paul McGowan was shrugged off the ball by Brown. At the end of the move Commons shot straight at Bain.
Dundee could count themselves extremely fortunate that they were only one behind, as Johansen was again through on goal after holding off James McPake. The save from Bain was probably his best of the first half.
After being over-run for 44 minutes, the 45th Dundee nearly scored an equaliser in the 45th. McGowan’s shot from the edge of the box seemed to come at Gordon in slow-motion but he ended up having to be at full stretch to claw it away.
Commons paid the price for all the missed Celtic chances in the first half, as he was replaced by Stokes.
Deila would have been a bit more content with the scoreline two minutes after the re-start though when his team doubled their lead.
Lustig crossed to the back post, where Griffiths had peeled off his marker. His downward header was parried by Bain but Johansen gave him no chance with the re-bound.
Bain had been Dundee’s best performer but he was fortunate when he tried to turn a Johansen cross over the bar and ended up directing it on to the face of it.
It wasn’t for the lack of trying that Celtic didn’t score more, but they were slack with their final ball more often than not.
Dundee stuck to their task but Gordon was as comfortable in the latter stages of this match as he was in the Old Firm game last weekend.