The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
Ferguson has sights set on group stages of Europa League
Aberdeen midfielder Lewis Ferguson is targeting Europa League progress for his club this season.
With the Dons set to compete in the Europa League for the seventh season in a row in August, Ferguson hopes this can be the year his club earns a chance of playing in the group stages.
Aberdeen have yet to reach the play-off round in the competition and Uefa announced on Wednesday each round will be contested over one-leg.
Ferguson is confident his side can progress this year.
He said: “It has always been the aim to get through all the qualifying rounds. We want to do that and go as far as we possibly can.”
“We were pretty unlucky last season because we went through two rounds and were put out in the third. To go that one step further and through that third qualifying round would be brilliant.
“We will need to wait and see what the draw will be and what the realistic aim is.”
Ferguson is also targeting domestic improvement this term with his club. Aberdeen finished fourth in the Premiership for the second year in a row last season and Ferguson believes the Dons should be aiming higher.
He said: “We should, as a club, with the talent we have in the squad, we should be finishing top three. To finish fourth twice in the last two seasons is disappointing.
“We did get the aim of Europe but we want to finish as high as we can and we want to finish higher than fourth place.
“My first season we were quite unlucky and it went to the last game and we finished fourth. I was quite confident that last season we would go on and get third spot even though Motherwell had a great season.
“We still had to play them a couple of times and
I think we would have had just that bit more. I felt we were coming into form and that would certainly have helped us.”
Aberdeen had to settle for fourth place but Ferguson’s contribution to the cause was recognised last week when he was named Scottish young player of the year by the Scottish Football Writers’ Association. The midfielder believes he improved on his debut season with the Dons in the last campaign but is still looking for more.
He said: “There are small details that you work on like getting quicker and sharper. I knew I was going to be coming up against players who would be smaller and more agile. That’s what I’ve tried to get into my game.
“I wanted to get more goals last season as in my first season I got eight. I wanted to beat that but I was playing a lot deeper a lot of the time so it was difficult.
“I’m still young now but in my first season at the club everything was new to me. Now I’m more experienced and am playing with more experienced boys, too, and I try to learn from them and add that into my game.”