The Manager | RedMatchday Feature

In RedMatchday Issue 12 there is a special interview with Derek McInnes.

In Wednesday night’s programme the Dons boss looks back over the past 12 months:

“I think that, without doubt, we really felt the benefit of the last winter break and in January and February we were really strong. Obviously we had plenty to play for, certainly towards the back end of the season. In previous years, we had been confirmed in second place some weeks before the end. We still had work to do to clinch that second spot and although we eventually landed up nine points clear, it was important we kept winning games. We had a Scottish Cup final to look forward to and it kept the focus. We could not really take our foot off the gas at any point.

“This season has been different after losing a number of players in the summer. I do think that whilst we have won games this season, we haven’t had too many where we have wiped the floor with teams and had a big scoreline. We’ve won games through doing enough but still always having that underlying feeling there is more in us.

“I think that comes down to the fact that when you make so many signings, you have different players coming in at different stages of their careers. It takes time for them to settle and get used to us and we also had players arrive who had not played for a while. A few of the signings hadn’t had regular football over the last few years so it took them time to get up to speed, but by and large the consistency of results has still been there.

“I think signing the players we did was pleasing. We can all see that they have got a talent and they are going to bring a lot to us. We have obviously got a few on loan such as Greg Stewart and Ryan Christie. We would have preferred to have those boys as our own players, but it was not possible even though we tried. So we have utilised the loan system, made some good permanent signings and by and large, all the players have settled in well.

“Now that we have come to the end of 2017, having had that time to settle and realise what is expected of them, hopefully we can go and kick on during the second half of the season and have a really strong 2018.

To read the interview in full please buy a copy of RedMatchday Issue 12 on Wednesday night.