RUSSELL’S BRAND STILL CENTRED ON SUCCESS
Anderson’s role may be away from the action now, but his aim is still to help Aberdeen excel
RUSSELL ANDERSON could spend all day wishing he was 10 years younger, caught up in a recurring daydream of leading this Aberdeen team into the heat of a title challenge and competing seriously for silverware. Mercifully, he’s doesn’t have the time.
As his club soared last season, Anderson was stricken.
As Derek McInnes made adjustments and personnel improvements to his dressing room this summer, the former captain was getting his feet under a desk in his new office along the corridor.
‘As much as I loved my whole time here, there’s no getting away from the fact we had some struggles over the years,’ said Anderson. ‘Now this is the most successful and enjoyable time for a long period, it would’ve been nice to play longer.
‘But you just have to move on. In terms of the job I’m doing now, it certainly helps they’re doing well.’
Booked on his farewell appearance for Aberdeen in May, the former centre-half is now handing out cards. They inform that the 36-yearold is the Business Development Executive of the Corporate and Community arm of the club.
This does not preclude him from maintaining some influence on the fortunes of McInnes and a squad of players who have given the city hope that an era of sustained achievement has arrived.
His frustrated fix of involvement might now be restricted to lunchtime chats with former team-mates after their training, a dose of football that will dilute over time as new players come and old colleagues go.
However, the chances of future success will be enhanced by the deal Anderson is trying to secure.
One of the many tasks in the new role is to encourage a backer for a training ground, something identified on day one of the McInnes era in March 2013 when the manager was shocked to discover how far Aberdeen lagged behind their counterparts in terms of facilities.
McInnes has instigated a resurgence on the park in spite of the club falling short away from Pittodrie. Anderson helped them to League Cup glory in 2013 and, without their injured skipper, the Dons stayed competitive with Celtic until the first Saturday in May.
The club is actively examining options, sites have been identified and the funding is being pursued by Anderson to satisfy McInnes that standards are on the rise in every department of the Aberdeen he’s committed to until 2019.
‘There was a deal with the university that, disappointingly, couldn’t get over the line,’ reports Anderson. ‘For one reason or another it didn’t feel right and it was important to realise that and move on. We’re going to need financial support for that and it’s challenging up here at the moment for a lot of companies. The economy in Aberdeen is very much oil-and-gas-related.
‘That’s not to say there aren’t people out there who’ve shown an interest and are willing to support the club. We have to do our homework and present them with a viable plan. It’s essential that we get some- thing in the near future. There are logistics about coming to the stadium, the players have to report, change, get on a bus, travel halfway across the city, then train.
‘Come the winter months and it’s cold, wet, dark and frozen pitches and you’re looking for venues to train. That’s not ideal.
‘Very early on the manager identified areas that we should have been performing better in. If you add all those up then it will provide a better team on the pitch.’
NOT at the close of any season in his playing career did a week on a training ground to start the summer appear attractive to Anderson. A qualified financial adviser, the intrigue of economics was always the pull in preference to Largs. Bad injuries during his spell in England with Sunderland accelerated the interest in pursuing a post-playing career and the studying, rather than coaching courses, was an easy decision.
The pace of life has changed, a fact drummed home during the international break and wife Claire and teenage boys Jevan and Cole adapting to dad not being around. Players on the go since a mid-June start for Europa League qualifying were granted extra time off.
The Pittodrie corridors were quieter, the football chat turned down but the workload for Anderson naturally did not wear off.
‘It’s a bit of a culture shock,’ he grinned. ‘Players had days off to make up for the lack of time in summer. And I was in every day — nine to five. One was actually nine to nine, which is the exception rather than the rule, but I’m enjoying it.
‘As footballers we’re quite lucky with spare time in afternoons and I was around for a lot of the time, picking kids up from school. There’s more to it than just me, it’s how the family adapt to it as well.
‘It’s funny because some players who retire say they miss the game. Some say they miss the Monday to Friday. I suppose I’m fortunate in a sense that I still get the Monday to Friday, in part, because I’m still in touch with the players, maybe seeing them at lunchtime.
‘So it’s probably the games I miss more. I know I’m not part of the team and that will probably diminish and change with time. Assuming I’m here for a while, the longer that continues new players come in and I won’t have that bond, that relationship. There’s a bit of envy there when you’re watching these games. But that’s life.’
It’s understandable, then, that on the afternoon of May 24, his 413rd and final appearance of two spells representing Aberdeen, Anderson had a moment.
He had not played since August 23 and was only encouraged to keep grinding back from a catalogue of crushing injury setbacks by McInnes during a winter of deep discontent.
He admitted: ‘There was a spell in the St Johnstone game where I thought: “Have I made the right decision here?” I thought I was comfortable in the game. There was a small part saying maybe I should have thought about playing a little longer. Perhaps that was the whole occasion of the last day.’
Agreements over his new job with chief executive George Yule were franked by chairman Stewart Milne — ‘the longer I’ve been here, the better I’ve got to know him’ — and Anderson entered the business world, perhaps a gateway to football administration. He will be no less ambitious in his new field than he was in his club and 11-cap Scotland career.
‘Like anything, you want to be successful in the job that you do,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to be doing what I’m doing now in five, 10 years. I certainly want to progress myself and my career, George and the chairman realised I’ve got ambitions. What opportunities that might bring, I’m not too sure. ‘I want to do well here. The club is in a good place off and on the field. A chief executive-type role? Why not? But, to be honest, it’s similar to when someone asks the player if you want to move somewhere else or you want to be the manager. ‘I’ve an awful lot to learn in my trade. I’m not naïve enough to think I could go and do other roles at the club straight away. But we’ll see where it leads.’