There haven’t been too many signings in recent years that have been welcomed with the universal acclaim of Graeme Shinnie, a feat even more remarkable when you consider that we had to wait months for him to actually come here once the deal had been struck last January.
That was the start of what Graeme acknowledges was a quite extraordinary year.
“2015 would have to be the best year of my career so far. Winning the Scottish Cup, my first major trophy and captaining the side would have to be the pinnacle of my career up to this point. That was an amazing day.
“To be honest, I don’t think I can say I enjoyed the Scottish Cup final. I obviously enjoyed it afterwards but during the game, it was one of those that we were expected to win, we did not play overly well but we won which was the only thing that mattered, but there was a lot of pressure on it. Afterwards it was amazing!
“I didn’t get much of a break before coming into Aberdeen, but that was fine because one of the most enjoyable times in my footballing career was the European games, especially the one in Croatia. It would have to be up there as one of my favourite matches. In that game against Rijeka we played well throughout and I really enjoyed the 90 minutes. It was such a complete team performance.
“I had never experienced playing in Europe before. It was one of the things I was looking forward to coming here. It is just completely different. Different surroundings, you are travelling to different countries, difficult cultures, playing in different stadiums, with different weather, you are preparing for the game differently, you are eating different foods, it is all that kind of stuff, it’s a great challenge, it takes you out of the comfort zone.
“I really enjoyed the three games and it was just disappointing we could not progress further because I think we had the beating of that Kairat team. But these things happen. We just have to make sure we get back again next season”.
Having been an ever present since joining the Dons, Graeme has had plenty of opportunity to settle into the Pittodrie way of life. What are the differences between life at Inverness and here in the Granite City?
“This is a bigger club. Expectation levels are obviously higher. I don’t mean any disrespect to Inverness, they are a terrific club with a lot of great people working there and I really enjoyed my time up there. But when I was at Inverness last season the fans wanted us to win a trophy but maybe they were not expecting it. Here you are expected to win things.
“One of the things that really excited me here was the fanbase, the number of supporters we get at home games and the number of fans we get at away games. You look at the support we took to Edinburgh for the cup game for instance. It was incredible running out and seeing the whole stand behind the goal full of Aberdeen fans. On the downside, when you don’t deliver the goods for them, it is not so great. You feel responsible for letting them down. You feel really bad after a game. When you win a game, then you can celebrate with them on the final whistle and there’s no better feeling in football than that.
“As players we feel the same as the supporters after a defeat. We were hurting massively with going out of the cup. I don’t read newspapers, I try and stay away from all that stuff. I do go on social media from time to time but I tend to be selective as to what I look at. As a player, most of all you speak to your family about it. I had to travel home with my dad from the Scottish Cup defeat at Tynecastle. The journey from Edinburgh to Aberdeen was possibly the worst journey I could ask for! As soon as I got in the car, my dad told me exactly how it was. He is my biggest fan, but also my biggest critic. If I have had a bad performance he will let me know!
“We know ourselves we did not play well. Everyone knows that. But despite that, we still created a couple of chances but it was not meant to be. There can be a very fine line between winning and losing a football match. Sometimes you can play well and lose or draw a game. Sometimes you cannot be at your best but still come out on top. At this level it is very fine margins that separate most of the sides.
“After a defeat, there is nothing you can do about it. You have to move on and concentrate on the next game. That is the thing about being a footballer there is always another game around the corner to get yourself prepared for. You can’t do that properly if you are still thinking about what happened the week before.
“Every game is different. Every player would love to go out and dominate every game for 90 minutes but it just does not happen, not very often anyway. You know there are going to spells of the game where the opposition are going to have pressure and then there are going to be spells when we have pressure. You have to be able to deal with that. And we have responded with two important wins in the last two games. Now we have to try and continue that run against Celtic tonight”.
When he was playing at Inverness, there was double trouble for the opposition in the form of the Shinnie brothers, Graeme and Andrew, now down in England. Are they still close?
“We do speak, whenever he bothers to answer his phone! I speak to him as regularly as I can. When we do speak we don’t overly chat much about football. We kind of know what each other are doing. We keep an eye on each other’s team to see how they are doing. We talk more about other stuff.
“We lived together in Inverness for two years but he is now down in Birmingham so I don’t see much of him. I’ve had a child so it makes it harder to go down and visit him when I do get any time off but we still text and phone each other and I still enjoy winding him up whenever I can!
“He had an opportunity when he was at Inverness to go and play in England. It was a big decision for him to make and we spoke about it a lot, but he felt to was an opportunity he could not turn down. He has enjoyed it down there. He has been in and out of the team, so he has not played as regularly as he would have liked, but he has enjoyed moving to a different city and facing a different challenge. Last week he joined Rotherham United on loan.
“It was actually really good playing in the same team. When I think back, the amount of goals that we created together, we probably did have a kind of understanding that you would maybe not have with someone else. Living together off the park was helpful too.
“When we were younger, we were very close football wise, playing out in the garden or in the park. He then went down to Rangers when he was 16, so it was good to be back together in Inverness, seeing a lot more of each other, living together and making him do my dishes! It was decent!”
The season run-in really starts tonight with the visit of Celtic. What are Graeme’s hopes for the next three months of football?
“We’ve been a bit inconsistent this season in that we made such a great start to the season and then took a dip, but now we’re on a good run again. We have put ourselves in a strong position in the league. I think the most important thing is putting winning runs together like we did at the start of the season.
“Now all our focus is on the league. We just have to keep taking each game as it comes, treating these last 15 games as cup finals, starting with the visit of Celtic. We just have to put as many points on the board as we can and then see where we are later on in the season. There is so much to play for and we need the fans to stick with us as much as they can. It is then up to us to make sure we give them something to cheer.
“I think the fans will always set the bar high for you. I think they are entitled to do that. The whole season, they have been tremendous. Since the day I arrived, and some time before that, the backing they have given me has been different class. It’s not an unfair burden on us for them to expect big things of us. Not at all. It’s something that drives us on.
“For the rest of the season we need to go and do the business and have a strong push. There’s nothing we can do about the cups now but there is something we can do about the league. We’re in good form, we need to keep that going and continue our unbeaten run and put another run of wins together.
“It would be great to end the season on a high, wherever that means us finishing. I am loving it here and it would be great to keep that momentum going. Whether I am playing at left-back or in midfield, I will play wherever the manager wants me to go.
“It is great playing in front of so many people at Pittodrie and when we travel away. The dressing room is brilliant and everyone the club has been great since I have been here. Here’s hoping that all continues”.
