When Scott McKenna’s
football career ends, he could do worse than try his hand as a spin doctor.
The Aberdeen defender, the subject of repeated speculation since last season that his time at the club is nearing a conclusion, has presented the other side of a Dons’ coin that focused on five successive results in which they failed to score.
That run was broken at Hamilton last Tuesday with a 3-1 victory with McKenna asking: “Why haven’t people been talking about our four clean sheets in our last seven games?”
Like his team-mates, the 23-year-old has been feeling the heat in recent weeks because of performances deemed sub-standard by their own fans.
Today’s lunchtime clash against Celtic at Pittodrie, however, offers them the chance for continued rehabilitation following that win at Hamilton, though satisfying the Red Army with the champions in full flight is, as those former players-turned-pundits might say, “a big ask.”
There is also the memory of that crushing 4-0 Pittodrie loss to the Parkhead side
seven weeks ago, a thumping that McKenna attempts to put into perspective.
“Of course Celtic are always a test,” he said. “With it being back at home again, we’re looking to right a few wrongs from the last time.
“That was a difficult experience for us all, being 4-0 down at half-time. We didn’t really lay a glove on them and we let them do what they wanted to do. That was the same weekend that Southampton were beaten 9-0 by Leicester on the Friday night. I was sitting there at half-time at Pittodrie thinking, ‘This can’t happen; we can’t end up 9-0’.
“That thought may have been in the back my mind, but Celtic took their foot off the gas in the second half and didn’t get another goal. It saved us a wee bit more embarrassment, but it was already bad enough.”
McKenna, 23, has been at the heart of the Aberdeen
defence since he began to
establish himself quickly
following his first-team debut in September 2017, and has
attracted the attention of a clutch of clubs ranging from
Aston Villa to Sheffield Wednesday, who made a late bid to lure him to Yorkshire on the eve of the current campaign.
Even today’s opponents placed a £3m-plus which the Dons decided was nowhere near the player’s transfer value.
Nonetheless, he’s been an ever present in Derek McInnes’s team and both player and manager recognise his move to a bigger club will come sooner rather than later. For the time being, however, all that matters is delivering something special this afternoon.
“You need 11 players on the pitch to have a very good game,” he said. “You need to try and disrupt the flow of play.
“You’ve got to aim to keep their most influential players quiet but they’ve got that many of them that it can be difficult sometimes. The manager will have us work on a shape and tactics so we’re set up to try and stop them as well as try and carry a threat going the other way.”
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