this morning, Derek McInnes will issue a personal explanation to every member of the Aberdeen squad who doesn't make the cut for the League Cup final in an attempt to avoid a repeat of the bad feeling created when Walter Smith surprisingly omitted him for the same showcase match 18 years ago.
McInnes, who is bidding to take the first major silverware to Pittodrie since the 1995 League Cup, had only been at Ibrox a matter of months in November 1996 when Rangers overcame Hearts 4-3 to win the trophy.
He had, however, been involved in every league match that season, and played every round in the cup, scoring doubles against both Ayr United and Dunfermline. He was therefore aghast at his non-inclusion for the final, with the three spots on the bench occupied by Theo Snelders, Peter van Vossen and David Robertson.
Although he received an explan- ation, in addition to a medal and a win bonus, in the manager's office some days later, almost two decades on McInnes will be sure to do things differently.
"I will tell every player, because I wasn't happy with the way that was done," said McInnes, who would go on to start, and win, the 1999 Old Firm Scottish Cup final. "I think I deserved an explan-ation at the time. I went to see Walter two days later because we were off the next day, and I asked what he was thinking. He said the goalkeeper situation was on his mind and he always liked to have a striker on the bench, which I understand, and he felt that David Robertson, for years of loyalty to him, deserved that loyalty back from him in the cup final.
"I can see that side of it now because David had earned that and I had only been there a year but I had been involved in every game and it still wasn't right how he did it. He 100% should have told me before. But he gave me my medal in his office and promised me the win bonus."
The episode has heightened McInnes' sensitivity to the human cost of the decisions he makes.
"He [Smith] named the team in the dressing room about an hour-and-a-half to two hours before kick-off and I didn't think for a minute I wouldn't be playing," he said. "I never saw it coming but I now recognise that he had a job to do and picked the team to win the game and they won the cup. I still feel I played my part ... but that cup final is not a day to remember for me.
"The team will be named the day before, we always do that, and the subs on the morning of the game. There are five subs but there are tough decisions to make."
Victory today would cap a remarkable upturn in the fortunes of the 42-year-old, who was sacked by Bristol City in January 2013, having saved the South West club from relegation the previous summer. However, he was unable to keep them off the foot of the Championship table by the turn of the year and City now reside in the mid-reaches of League One. McInnes feels vindicated by what has befallen the club and admits that proving people wrong is a form of motivation.
"We kept them up from an impossible situation and in a 15-month period I felt that 12 months of that we were all right," McInnes said. "There's always got to be some sort of motivation and I do think, not just in relation to this, that you are always trying to prove people wrong, because the people who love you, your family and the rest, they are there for you anyway, whether you win games or lose games."
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