Derek McInnes hails Kenny McLean for grabbing golden goal that keeps Aberdeen

“We didn’t start positively enough and I didn’t think we were courageous enough”. They didn’t roll over and they came out fighting.

“Similar to the Croatian game [against Rejika], we didn’t start with enough positive play”, BBC Sport quotes the 44-year-old as saying. I thought we were too deep as a team in that opening period. Every time we have managed to score an away goal, we have always progressed.

“If we play for the full 90 minutes in the second leg the way we played the last hour of the game here then I feel we have an excellent chance to go through”.

As for the aforementioned journey, the Dons ended up chartering themselves a private jet to make the gargantuan 3,415-mile trip out to Almaty (the plane reportedly cost the Scottish club £200,000 to hire – twice the amount they would have received in UEFA prize money had they actually won the game). “I think he did absolutely fine for us last season”, McInnes said. “But that’s him got two very important goals”.

“Time and time again he was getting into goalscoring positions”.

“Last week [in the previous round against Croats Rijeka] we got 17,000 and it was a massive factor”.

And it got worse two minutes later when Kairat doubled their advantage with a wonder-strike from their captain.

Goals from Mikhail Bakaev in the 13th minute and the impressive Bauyrzhan Islamkhan in the 22nd, who scored an absolute rocket from 30 yards out past on-loan Liverpool goalkeeper Danny Ward, made it seem like the Dons’ European adventure was coming to a close – in Asia – but subsitute Kenny McClean thumped home a goal in the second half to keep them in the tie.

McInnes said: “Kenny was rewarded with his drive and positivity with his goal”. On a rare venture upfield, Niall McGinn’s cutback was deflected perfectly into the path of fellow sub McLean and he rifled the ball home from close range. And the goal could go a long way to repaying the £300,000 transfer fee paid to St Mirren.