Amid another perpetual motion performance, skipper Graeme Shinnie was also a goalscoring hero against Aidrieonians, grabbing the crucial equaliser early in the second half. That takes his tally to two goals in three games, something of a goal glut by previous standards.
“I don’t know if it’s the new haircut, or it’s the manager, or what it is. I’m just trying to play the way I always have done. Get forward, drive the team on as much as I can, and I’ve been able to chip in with a couple of goals, which is even better. With Sivert being in beside me, there’s a bit of an insurance policy. He’s more of a sitter, and I’m quite hyper on the pitch, I like to get about as much as I can, forwards and even going backwards, trying to help out the defence.
“My target is just to score every season, and I think I’ve done that for the majority of seasons that I’ve played. I’ve done it early this season, which is good. Everything now is a bonus!
“It’s important for the team to get goals from different areas of the pitch. Last season, obviously, we were relying on Bojan, which we don’t want. Jamie chipped in with a lot last season but it’s trying to get goals from every area of the pitch.”
The Dons have collected maximum points from the three group games they’ve played and a draw or better against Dumbarton will see them advance into the knock-out stages of the competition.
“We want to get a bit of momentum. It’s still early days, these cup games are competitive, but it’s still technically pre-season. This is the first time I’ve been involved in these cup games, so it’s very different.
“With the new manager, everything’s still really fresh, but the most important thing at a club like Aberdeen is winning games. That never changes. We’ve managed to do that. We’ve won the three games, which is important. We’ll keep learning and keep developing every week and training the way the manager wants. But to have won all the games so far is good, and we need to finish the job on Saturday.
“It wasn’t an easy game, Airdrie played well, especially in the first half. The first half, I didn’t feel like we got our press right at times. We were pressing in singles instead of as a team, and we missed the intensity in the first half. Saying that, we had a couple of presses that we could have scored from, and it could have been different.
“But in the second half, I thought we were a lot better in the intensity that we were playing with, and the pace that we attacked with, and even the back line being right up and aggressive was where we wanted to be. It’s an encouraging start.”
