Graeme Shinnie has admitted the Midas touch of Jimmy Thelin has even got him daring to dream of finally lifting a trophy as Aberdeen captain.
The gutsy midfielder will lead the Dons out at Hampden looking to continue their glory run by taking care of Celtic in Saturday’s Premier Sports Cup semi-final. Thelin has sparked a Reds revival that has seen them go 16 games undefeated and given them a real confidence that this could be a special season Shinnie, who lifted the Scottish Cup with Inverness, said: “Of course. I think everyone in football wants to win trophies.
“I’ve been lucky enough to do it once. I’d like to have done it again. But it’s tough. It’s tough to do. It’s very, very difficult to win trophies. But actually it’s something that I’m desperate to do.”
Aberdeen are neck and neck with Celtic at the top of the Premiership. They head to the national stadium on a high after beating Rangers on Wednesday and they also came back to get a draw against Brendan Rodgers’ side at Parkhead.
Shinnie insisted that Aberdeen will be focusing on themselves rather than Celtic. He stated: “If you focus on other things, then you take your eye off the ball. That’s when you can start making mistakes. What we’ve been good at is focusing on what we want to do and the way we want to play.”
Their unbeaten start has got Aberdeen being talked about as potential title contenders but Shinnie believes that is premature. He stated: “Of course. Everyone wants that in football. Right now, there’s no thought of lifting the league trophy. There’s no thought of that. If you ask me in April, start of May and we are where we are, then it may be a bit different.
“Right now, it’s a million miles away. If you start looking at that sort of thing, you take your eye off the ball. Complacency can start to kick in. Within a few games, you could have thrown a lot away. We’ve worked hard to get to where we are now, but you need to keep it going. You need to sustain it. Consistency is important, and carrying that on is what the manager has focused on.”
The good thing for Aberdeen is they are getting results but they know there is room for improvement. Shinnie stated: “We’re relatively still early in the manager’s era and he’s crammed a lot in, in a short space of time.
“To be fair to the team, they’ve taken it on well in what we’re trying to do but in some of the games as well we haven’t been at our best. I think the most important thing for us just now is that we’re winning these games, which is important. But there’s still room for improvement and that’s what we’re focused on.”
Aberdeen’s success has also continued after the big-money sale of Bojan Miovski. Shinnie believes they have all come together to fill that goal void. The Dons stated: “Nobody would notice that Bojan has probably left but Bojan was a massive part of our team.
“So that’s a compliment to the staff and the squad as well. We’ve lost a talisman and it hasn’t really affected the squad.
“The boys are chipping in. Dev and a lot of the different goalscorers. That’s important.
“We probably relied on that too much. Whereas this season it’s been spread around, which is important for the squad.”