Aberdeen will head to face Rangers on Saturday with more than half their starting XI likely to be Ibrox novices.
But Jim Goodwin insists there won’t be a shred of rookie nerves among his players as they look to ramp up the pressure on Gio van Bronckhorst and his misfiring Gers. The Dons boss is adamant there is no fear factor going to Govan.
In fact, if anyone is going to wilt under the spotlight he hopes it will be the home side as Aberdeen look to turn the heat from 50,000 home supporters on van Bronckhost’s toiling stars after another miserable week at home and in Europe. Goodwin insists his summer signings including Ylber Ramadani, Bojan Miovski and Duk are made for the big stage. And just a fortnight after Hibs boss Lee Johnson suggested some players are “brainwashed” into fearing the Old Firm, his opposite number at Pittodrie is desperate to prove that’s not the case.
Of the 11 players who started last week’s 2-1 win at Motherwell that moved Aberdeen into third spot, seven have never played at Ibrox. And Goodwin said: “The reason why some of them have come to Scotland is to test themselves against international quality players and play at top stadiums.
“They will be excited and I don’t think they will be overawed. There is no fear factor. Most of them haven’t played there at all and we tried to explain to them what to expect.
“We played some clips and said the atmosphere was always intense but we have to use that to our advantage. We can’t allow Rangers any rhythm and try to make the fans' anxiety creep onto the pitch and that will hopefully have a negative impact on the pitch.
“All the guys are looking forward to it, especially the new lads. We spoke about how teams sometimes go into these types of games with a defeatist mindset.
“Some people have already lost the game before they get there. However our guys are in a great place. I think there is a real air of positivity and excitement about the place.
“I don’t sense any nerves or any anxiety. There are guys in the dressing room who want to go and test themselves against the best teams in the county.
“Right now Celtic and Rangers are the top two teams and we want to go and see how far away we are from bridging that gap. These players don’t fear going into any games.
“They are all senior internationals – Duk, Miovski and Ramadani. They are all made of tough stuff. They respect opposition but they don’t over-respect them.
“They believe they belong there, believe that they are capable of competing at that level against Celtic and Rangers. There’s no doubt Rangers have had a dip in form.
“We need to focus on the good things from Aberdeen’s perspective. We have been playing well, we have won our last three and scoring a lot of goals. Only Celtic have scored more than us in all competitions and only they have conceded less than us in all competitions as well. From our point of view we are in a good place and I won’t worry too much about Rangers and their predicament.”
The new breed of Dons stars might not be fully aware of what the powderkeg fixture means to the supporters. It’s a point Goodwin stressed at his weekly team meeting on Thursday morning as he looks to end the Dons’ seven-game winless run in Govan.
The form book heading into the fixture is similar to when last month’s scheduled first meeting of the sides at Pittodrie was postponed due to the death of the Queen. Rangers were reeling off the back of consecutive 4-0 drubbings to Celtic and Ajax back then and this time go into the game having drawn at home to Livingston last week and been comprehensively beaten 3-0 by Napoli in Italy on Wednesday night.
Goodwin said: “I think it’s probably quite a similar situation, really. When the last game was postponed, we were playing well and they maybe weren’t on such a good run. By Gio’s own admission, Rangers are not on a particularly great run of form.
“They are going through a bit of a difficult period right now. But you’ve always got to be wary of big teams in those situations.
“Because they have some big players, international quality, and no doubt their pride will be hurting, especially off the back of how disappointing the Champions League group stage has been. They’ll be wanting to make amends.
“Our boys are really fresh. We’ve looked after them this week. We’ve had a bit of de-load week, if you like, and we want to save as much energy as possible for the weekend.
“Whereas Rangers had a massive game on Wednesday night. They’re probably not getting back into Glasgow until the early hours of Thursday morning. We’ve got to use all of those things to our advantage.
“Historically, there is a lot of emotion involved in the fixture. In our group meeting, we made our players aware of what the fixture means to the fans.
“We emphasised that it’s almost going to be like a derby game. There’s a hell of a lot on the line, the bragging rights for the supporters. There is a lot at stake. It’s a significant game for everybody.”
