Jimmy Thelin has insisted he isn’t getting stressed about Aberdeen’s long winless run.
The Dons, after a blistering unbeaten start, haven’t won in 10 games and that is something they will be hoping to put right when Hearts come calling on Sunday. Thelin has previously had runs of nine without a victory at Elfsborg in 2018 and 2022 and on every occasion his side came through it and became even stronger.
The Swede explained: “When you are in the process of starting a journey or building a journey, there can be bumps in the road. The learning point I have had from that in the past is to have the end point clear and not get stressed. It’s natural when you change a lot of things the rhythm isn’t perfect. There are also periods when you get injuries that also puts more stress on the players who are fresh because you can’t make as many substitutions and you get setbacks on them.
“That’s why sometimes when you can’t rest players you need to rest because you don’t have enough, you get shaky results. But when players get stronger they handle the stress better long-term. “I am not stressed right now, we are focused and have learned from previous situations.
“If you believe in something, do it with one hundred percent conviction and don’t get stressed about it. If you have a clear picture about what you’re going to write, go for that.”
Thelin explained the reasons for the previous poor runs and admitted there were mitigating circumstances, like at Aberdeen. He recalled: “The first time was when we were building the team and there were a lot of changes.
“We changed a lot of players during those periods, we brought a lot of players out, changed the way we trained and recruited. We changed everything, the direction of the club changed and it was big work.
“It was a good experience for me to work with the staff and sporting director to change so much – everything. It was an interesting time and in the other period, it was around the transfer window. We had so many situations where players were half-way out of the door and we didn’t have the players in.
“In 2022, there were good performances but we were missing some links and a lot of the games were 0-0, 1-0, 2-1 so there weren’t big problems, we just couldn’t get games over the line. After that we won a lot of games and arrived well at the end of the season.”