The fallout of Celtic’s win over Aberdeen in the League Cup continues as Graeme Shinnie now speaks out about the Hampden defeat.
The Aberdeen captain was the hero at Celtic Park after Jimmy Thelin’s team earned a 2-2 draw after battling back from two first-half goals from Reo Hatate and Kyogo Furuhashi appeared to put the Hoops into cruise control.
However, it appears that the Celtic players learned their lesson and put Aberdeen to bed at Hampden as the Bhoys just didn’t let up as they smashed six goals to ensure there was no League Cup comeback.
Reflecting on the result, Aberdeen captain, Graeme Shinnie, admits the result ‘hurt’ his team and said Jimmy Thelin’s team were ‘annoyed’ at how Celtic made them play.
Graeme Shinnie confesses Celtic have ‘hurt’ Aberdeen
Shinnie told the Press & Journal, “This will hurt for a few days, but once you get over it, it’s about moving on and we’re in a strong position in the league.
“We have to focus on that now and learn from this. We’re annoyed at how we played but it’s done now and we have to look forward.
“We have to be more resilient, roll our sleeves up and fight more. It’s a learning curve for everyone. We played at Celtic Park and got a draw but every game is different.
“If you allow Celtic to be what they can be then Saturday is what happens. We have to react to it.”
Graeme Shinnie admits Aberdeen were punished by Celtic
Aberdeen started the game well and contained Celtic in the early stages but after Cameron Carter-Vickers opened the scoring, there was only ever going to be one winner.
“We just didn’t turn up at all,” Shinnie admits, “It wasn’t good enough, Celtic were very good on the day and we weren’t.
“When you give them that they’ll punish you. I felt we didn’t get near them, we didn’t have enough resilience and the goals were really poor. We let them dictate the play and do what they wanted at times.
“If you let them do that they’ll punish you – and they did. Credit to them, they moved the ball very well and had rotations like they normally do.
“They played really well and when they do that and we don’t play to our full capacity that’s what happens.”
The result left Brendan Rodgers absolutely delighted and he hailed Celtic’s performance against The Dons as ‘very good’.
Celtic now face Rangers in the League Cup final next month where Rodgers will be hoping to win the trophy that eluded him last season.
Rangers boss Philippe Clement sounded worried about facing Celtic as he admitted facing Rodgers’ team next month presents a ‘really big challenge’ for his side.
With Celtic also nine points ahead of Rangers in the league, beating the Ibrox club will leave their season practically in tatters with the Scottish Cup looking like their only chance of silverware this season.
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