Graeme Shinnie felt ‘stars aligned’ for Aberdeen’s Scottish Cup final win

Graeme Shinnie believes the stars aligned when Aberdeen emerged victorious in their Scottish Gas Scottish Cup final win over Celtic.

The Hoops were heavy favourites to complete the domestic treble at Hampden on Saturday and it looked on the cards when they took the lead in the 39th minute with an own goal from Alfie Dorrington.

Jimmy Thelin’s men kept battling and levelled in the 83rd minute through a mistake by Celtic keeper Kasper Schmeichel and when the game went all the way to penalties, Aberdeen number one Dimitar Mitov was the hero with saves from Callum McGregor and then Alistair Johnston as Aberdeen scored all five of their spot-kicks.

Captain Shinnie led the way with the first penalty and clinched a second winners medal after leading Inverness to their 2015 Scottish Cup triumph.

“Yes, it’s weird because everything was sort of aligned,” said the 33-year-old, who revealed former Aberdeen boss Sir Alex Ferguson sent a message of support before the game.

“It was 10 years since I won it with Inverness, my 300th game (for Aberdeen). I was playing full-back. I didn’t play there on Saturday, but I had been playing full-back recently, which is where I won it with Inverness.

“So it was almost like the stars were aligned and my two children were here.

“My eldest was four months or something the last time and my youngest wasn’t born, so I had to renew the memories with them and unbelievable memories that I will have forever.”

Shinnie feels he was redeemed for not taking a penalty when Inverness lost the 2014 League Cup final to Aberdeen in a shootout at Celtic Park.

He said: “Back in 2014, when we lost the League Cup to Aberdeen, I didn’t take one. I took a knock in extra time and that probably put me off a little bit.

“I should have still taken one and after that, I regretted it so much and since that day on, I’ve always wanted to be the first penalty taker.

“I’m the captain and I want to lead by example and Saturday was no different.

“I felt confident going up and taking the penalty and then the rest of the guys’ penalties were top drawer.

“I told them before the game what it can mean to everyone.

“We came this far in the season, we had to leave it all out there.

“And even before penalties I said to the boys, whatever happens here I’m really proud of you all because I asked them to leave everything on the pitch and I felt like they done that.

“So no matter what happened in the end, I was really proud of them and it just makes it that much better that we won it.”

Aberdeen finished fifth in the table but their first Scottish Cup win since 1990 guarantees European group stage football next season

Shinnie believes a rollercoaster campaign has taken on a different complexion.

He said: “There’s been many ups and downs this season and a lot of people probably questioned the manager and questioned the team.

“Fifth wasn’t the end of the world, but it wasn’t where we wanted it to be.

“We were in the fight for third, beating Hibs in the first game after the split and then end up finishing fifth, which we weren’t happy about.

“But the season in a whole it wasn’t bad.

“Winning this now has changed everything and everyone will look at it in a completely different way.

“If you got beat, then you probably wouldn’t be saying the same thing.

“So one game can change everything. These players and the manager will be remembered for a long time.”