Jimmy Thelin looking for ultimate Aberdeen high from rollercoaster first season (2025)

The Swede takes his Dons to Hampden on Saturday to take on Hearts with the winner facing St Johnstone or Celtic in the final

Jimmy Thelin knows his time at Aberdeen has been something of a rollercoaster ride but he is looking for it to end with the ultimate high of a Scottish Cup Final.

The Swede takes his Dons to Hampden on Saturday to take on Hearts in the first of the semi-finals.

Thelin saw his side make an amazing unbeaten 16 game start to the season before their form fell off a cliff and they went 14 without a Premiership win.

They now look to be back on the rails, six games unbeaten, and are looking to push for guaranteed group stage football, through the cup and by finishing third in the Premiership.

Thelin said: “We're getting better. So I really believe that we are better and more consistent again. The season so far has been a little bit up and down. We have been up, up, up, and then we go down, down, down and now we are on the way back and more stable again.”

Thelin made wholesale changes to his squad in January and performed major surgery on his defence.

The signings of Alexander Jensen, Mats Knoester, Kristers Tobers and Alfie Dorrington appear to have given the Dons a bit more defensive stability, from which they have found form again.

Thelin said: “I think we are back where we were and more stable and more players are ready to compete and help the team to win games. That's why we have been better and more stable when we still have some injuries and situations happen.

“But more players are ready to compete and also give us results in the right way. We’re more balanced, they understand better, they have grown in their performance.”

Some Aberdeen fans were upset that the Dons surrendered a 2-0 lead to 10 man Rangers on Sunday. Thelin accepts they should have seen out the game but insisted there were positives.

"Some parts were really good and it is easy to forget because of the result," he claimed. "Some parts of the game were really good, as they were in the game before that and the game before that, so we are looking forward to the semi-final."

The likes of Tobers and keeper Dimitar Mitov have been out in recent weeks and are doubts for the Hampden trip.

The manager thinks his squad now has more about them and has shown it can now cope more when so-called bigger players are out.

The former Elfsborg boss explained: “So when someone is out now, we don't drop so much in the performance and also some players are adding and growing a lot into the team.

“The time, that's the training and the time to adapt. It's always easy to say, players sometimes when they arrive that they should perform from the first day, but that's not usually how it works.

“It takes time. Now we have got more and more players to contribute, perform and put in good performances. That's what gives us better results.”

His first season has been a baptism of fire. He has brought in 13 players and with so many changes he knows there was going to be a fair bit of turbulence along the way.

The Dons manager claimed: “It's not easy when you arrive directly from another team in the middle of the season and try to perform.

“Or we have to change or even we have to tweak some parts when some players are out for a long time. How can we create chances How can we defend better?

“So with that, I think it strengthens the team and also when you have challenging times sometimes when you come out on the other side, you always grow in life and in football or whatever.”

The Dons go into the split sitting fifth, after they disappointingly dropped two points at home to Rangers.

Thelin knows there are still massive prizes to play for over the next six matches, although he hopes that extends to seven with a Scottish Cup Final.

It would also end his semi-final jinx and the fourth time of asking as he has fallen there twice with Elfsborg and with Aberdeen, when they lost 6-0 to Celtic in the Premier Sports Cup on their last visit to Hampden.

“The season is not over yet,” the 47-year-old insisted. “Still, we have a lot of things to do before the season is over to have a good end result on the table when everything is done. But I think we are ready to play the last games of the season in a good way.”