We spoke with Paul Sheerin as he looked ahead to a new season for the young Dons.
Aberdeenshire Cup
From our point of view, it’s great and we’ll obviously be younger in terms of squad. It’s similar for us with the Irn Bru Cup and we can put our wits against good experienced players. The Highland League is littered with talented players that have played a lot of games at that level and beyond so for us it’s a real test to play against these teams. As hard as it will be it would be nice to try and get a wee run in for us.
It will be young and probably even younger than we were against Arbroath. I’m not quite sure as I’m still to have the conversation with the manager in terms of what we can take. It will maybe mean we miss out on Bruce and Dean due to it being so close to the Burnley game and they’ve been part of the first team squad.
Reserve League
It doesn’t change the preparation too much in all honesty with the Development squad. The manager’s numbers in his squad are a still a little tight so at the minute we’ve still got the type of squad we had last year. That’s been beneficial to us because our pre-season has been tough in terms of opposition and playing against good experienced teams so from that point of view it’s been a great learning curve up until now. As the Reserve League develops it will be interesting to see just how much the manager plays senior players and I know injuries will affect it, issues with travelling etc, but it will still be interesting to see how the league develops as the season goes on.
Arbroath match
In midweek, Arbroath had a tremendous result against Ross County beating them 4-1 so we knew going there it was going to be a test. We had Krystian and Tomas playing which certainly helps making the backline more solid with the greatest respect to the younger ones. In terms of the preparation for the season up until now it’s been all positive for the main. We’ve had a couple of blips here and there with Inverurie in the second half, but to go to a team of Arbroath’s calibre and do as well as we did is really pleasing. Hopefully it will stand us in good stead for the season ahead.
Bruce Anderson and Dean Campbell
Bruce was really opportunistic with his goals and I’m really pleased for him. His all-round game is getting better as time goes by as well and there’s still a couple of wee things to improve on, but we’ll constantly chip away at them. Hopefully in time he’ll learn that side of the game and that’s probably helping more defensively from the front. Dean I thought was outstanding and dictated a game in the midfield with real experienced players and players who have played a lot of football at a good level. It was really pleasing to see him go and stand up to that challenge and Dean pretty much controlled the whole match for me.
Scott McKenna
He’s always the example we use because of the season he had. He’s went from development football this stage last season to Scotland captain at the end of the season. It’s been an incredible rise and one we thought he’d make but not as quick as he did, but I was always confident Scott would make it as a regular first team player and be capped for Scotland.
He’s always the example we use because of the season he had. He’s went from development football this stage last season to Scotland captain at the end of the season. It’s been an incredible rise and one we thought he’d make but not as quick as he did, but I was always confident Scott would make it as a regular first team player and be capped for Scotland.
