RONNY DEILA will take no chances as he attempts to steer his Celtic ship towards victory against Hearts tomorrow night.

The Hoops manager made six changes to his team for Sunday's Premiership clash with Motherwell, but had to call on the old guard of Kris Commons and skipper Scott Brown at half-time to come off the bench and salvage a 1-1 draw.

Deila admitted that his squad rotation policy failed to pay off against Well, and he is now ready to unleash his top Bhoys against Robbie Nielsen's Championship high-flyers to secure their safe passage to the next round. When asked if he'll play his strongest team, the Celtic boss said: "We try to do that every time, but there are a lot of reasons why we do it [rotate the squad]. We've a long, hard match programme and you have to give some players the opportunity to get match fit.

"That's something we are thinking of all the time. But in the game against Motherwell there were maybe too many changes. You could see that in the first-half.

"The League Cup is the first trophy we can win and, as I've said all the time, both domestic cups are important to us.

"I know the League Cup is sometimes used for playing younger teams, but we have used a lot of our squad the whole time.

"It's going to be a tough match, the players and I know it, but I'm looking forward to playing another game so we can bounce back from the result against Motherwell."

One player whose name did not appear on the teamsheet on Sunday was Leigh Griffiths.

The Scotland striker has fallen drastically down the pecking order at Celtic Park, with the club's new signings Stefan Scepovic and John Guidetti seemingly preferred by Deila along with Anthony Stokes.

Speculation arose yesterday that the former Wolverhampton forward was set to join Hibernian for his third loan spell with the Easter Road club as they seek to bring in reinforcements to kick-start their stalled Championship campaign.

But Deila insisted that a move east is currently unlikely for Griffiths and that the forward's focus is still on proving himself on the training grounds of Lennoxtown.

The Hoops gaffer said: "Leigh is at Celtic and nothing is going on with Hibs. There haven't been any real talks between the clubs.

"Leigh is fighting for a place in the starting XI. We want him here.

"He needs to work hard every day and take his chances when he gets them, same as everybody else at this club."

Deila added: "Every day we get to know one another better and every day we work on improving one another individually and collectively. It's not starting now, it's a process all the time.

"I think the second-half on Sunday was a good performance. The defence was good and we opened them up as well.

"But we needed the second goal and we didn't get that. We made it difficult for ourselves in the first half."