Stephen Glass “not counting chickens” ahead of emotional return to Gothenburg, scene of Aberdeen’s greatest triumph

Stephen Glass hailed his side’s triumphant start to their competitive season after Aberdeen blew away BK Hacken at Pittodrie in a 5-1 romp.

Aberdeen manager Stephen Glass - delighted with 5-1 win but not getting ahead of himself (Photo by Craig Foy / SNS Group)

It now seems inconceivable that they can fail to progress to the third qualifying round of the Europa Conference league in its inaugural season. Aberdeen cannot possibly desecrate the memory of Gothenburg by falling to their worst European defeat there next Thursday night.

However, Glass said he was not getting ahead of himself prior to what is set to prove an emotional return to a city with such deep and meaningful connotations for the club and supporters following 1983’s European Cup-Winners’ Cup win.

“We’re not going to count our chickens because this is a very good team and they’d like nothing better than to roll us over at their place,” said Glass. “Again, we’ll be prepared, we won’t get carried away. It’s important we do our jobs right, we have to go there and try to win the game. If you sit back and say: ‘don’t lose’ then bad things can happen.”

He did concede that they now have a degree of comfort in the tie. “There is a sense of reality that you don’t need to win 2-0 or 3-0 so that will be in the back of the players’ mind,” said Glass.

The manager was thrilled with the performance of debutant strikers Christian Ramirez and Jay Emmanuel-Thomas. The former scored his side’s fourth goal and struck up an immediate bond with the Pittodrie crowd while the latter proved promising foil for his partner.

“Centre forwards want to feel good about themselves by scoring goal,” said Glass with reference to Ramirez. “His contribution to the game was excellent. He’s sitting in there happy with his lot. His family will be happy and they’ll come over here and see he’s found a new home and he’s scoring goals.”

Emmanuel-Thomas did not get on the scoresheet but linked up well with Ramirez. “He showed what he’s capable of,” said Glass. “All our players did, the ones who’ve been here before, the ones we signed. JET is going to really add to the group, as is Christian. If you started to single people out, I’d end up going through them all.”

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