Scottish Premiership: Rangers v Aberdeen
Venue: Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow Date: Tuesday, 6 January Time: 20:00 GMT
Coverage: Listen on BBC Radio Scotland Extra & Sounds, live text commentary on the BBC Sport website & app
Aberdeen’s players have six months to “prove themselves”, says sporting director Lutz Pfannenstiel as the club seek Jimmy Thelin’s replacement as manager.
Pfannenstiel will assist interim manager Peter Leven and lead the search for a new boss.
The Swede left on Sunday, a day on from a loss at Falkirk that left the Dons eighth in the Scottish Premiership. Leven’s first match in charge of his third spell as interim boss is away to Rangers on Tuesday evening.
“You have now six months’ time to show yourself, you have six months’ time to prove you are worth wearing that badge, that you want to be an Aberdeen player, that you want to work for it,” Pfannenstiel told club media.
“If we are show ponying around and not really getting the effort on to the pitch and not getting the intensity up, then that tells me something that we need to change more.
“It’s an open door policy right now. We have a lot of players for selection. It’s always a reset when you bring in a new manager.
“It’s always an opportunity and the chance for all the players who were here for many, many years or many months, whatever it is to start at ground zero, to prove themselves, to make themselves available and show that they want to be part of the team.
“The best XI will play. Being eighth in the league is not good enough.”
Alfie Dorrington has left Aberdeen following his second loan spell from Tottenham and Pfannenstiel hinted more players would move on, while also suggesting their would be recruits in January.
“We have a very good squad when it comes to individual players but 11, 15 or 20 players who are individually good don’t necessarily make a good team,” he said.
“We need to have these connection players, who make the current squad better, to add that certain quality to make us into a better team.
“Will there be big changes coming in the future? 100%. Our squad is too big. The big first move is that we cut our squad. We move a few players out. [We can] add one or two positions with quality with players who have an immediate impact.
“Maybe six positions we need to be stronger and we need to improve.”
On the hunt for a new manager, Pfannenstiel says “there is some big names, there is some surprising names, there is some terrible names, there is all nationalities”.
He indicated the Dons would take their time so as to not “run into the wrong decision” but that the club wanted a “high pressing, hard working, high intensity team”.
And Pfannenstiel said he has “full belief” in Leven, who won six out of 12 games over his previous two spells as interim manager.
