Willie Miller’s brutal honesty set me on the path to Scotland captaincy, says Aberdeen defender Scott McKenna

SCOTT MCKENNA’S stock has risen at a phenomenal rate in the past two years.

In November, 2016, he moved from Aberdeen to Ayr United on loan.

In the time since, he has made himself a fixture at the centre of the Dons’ defence, captained Scotland in the Azteca Stadium in Mexico City, and seen bids for his signature of £3.5 million from Celtic, and £6.5m from Aston Villa, rejected.

McKenna is expected to attract interest from English Premier League clubs in the January transfer window.

And he puts much of his success down to the stick he took from Willie Miller as a 14-year-old.

For those whose football viewing dates back as far as the 1980s, both his progress and his partnership with clubmate, flatmate and fellow Scotland squad member, Mikey Devlin, is a pleasing throwback.

Those were the days when national coach Alex McLeish and Miller made the most formidable of central defensive duos for club and country.

They brought European glory to the Granite City, with the European Cup-Winners’ Cup success against Real Madrid and the Super Cup win against Bayern Munich forever part of Pittodrie folklore.

They pair also won all the domestic honours going and between them amassed 142 caps for Scotland.

Three decades on, and they are combining again to help hone McKenna’s considerable potential.

In the case of Miller, the 22-year-old explains it is a process which has been taking place almost his entire career.

“I bump into Willie time to time, and he always gives me feedback on the games he has watched me in,” said McKenna.

“Right from the start he has told it as it is.

“He coached me for a year or two, at the Under-17s when I was around 14 or 15.

“We were young kids, but he was brutally honest with us.

“I remember for the first couple of weeks, everyone was a bit taken aback by how he was.

“It is tough to hear. You are feeling, ‘He can’t speak to me like that’.

“But then we all came to realise he was doing it for our own benefit.

“And now my view is that is exactly the wakening you need when you are at that age.

“Things are plain sailing at first because you don’t tend to get a lot of criticism.

“I believe hearing Willie’s honest opinions kind of set us up – it certainly set me up – for stepping up into full-time football, when things obviously become a bit more cut-throat.

“Then suddenly people are shouting at you and getting on your case. So Willie’s honesty stood us in good stead. It kind of bridged that gap for us.

“Now, he will try and take a bit of credit. He is probably a bit biased towards me!

“When I speak to Willie, he is quite honest and gives me thoughts from his point of view. If I think they are worth taking on, then I will do that.

“But, obviously, he is someone who has played at the highest level with Aberdeen and Scotland. The career he had was fantastic.

“It is always nice to hear people who have had successful careers come out and say nice things about you.”

McKenna now acknowledges that the ability to take on constructive criticism is an essential skill players have to learn.

“You need to be able to take it on board. You can’t let it affect you,” he said.

“If people have negative things to say, you can’t let it swallow you up and get caught up in that negative time frame.

“I have to stress here, too, that Willie was great the other way. If you had done good things, then he would praise you.

“It was probably just the first time when things weren’t going our way.

“Normally before that, people would try and praise you. But he was the first one to give us negative feedback.

“And I think he definitely improved me as a communicator, especially in terms of playing as a centre-half.

“He was massive about our positioning and our communication.

“He said that if we could get other people working for us, then it would make our jobs way easier, which is probably quite true.

“It is always an area you can improve on.

“I always think I have been quite vocal – and then the manager or my dad will say: ‘I didn’t hear you today’.

“For something that is so simple, it is a massive part of the game.

“Alex McLeish was a fantastic defender, and he is a huge help to me too. We watch games back and he tells me where I can improve.

“We had a meeting at the start of the week, which was more a debrief of the last two games against Israel away and Portugal at Hampden.

“A couple of times he froze the footage we were watching, and asked, ‘Could you have been here, or done this?’.

“That’s communication.

“Obviously he showed great belief in me when asking me to captain the team against Mexico in the Azteca in the summer.

“It was a bit surreal because there were so many debutants in that squad.

“I think the team that started that game only had 28 caps between us.

“I was one of the more experienced players, even though I had no experience at all! But it was an honour to be given that responsibility.

“It can be tough at times with Scotland, and the Israel defeat was massively disappointing.

“We were 1-0 up and in a good position. I felt if I could just have helped keep a clean sheet, we’d win the game.

“They scored, and we still believed we could get a result. But then we went down to 10 men when John Soutter was sent off, which was a real kick in the teeth.

“That was a bit soft but it’s just hard to have thrown it away the way we did.

“At the time, we got a lot of criticism. But we just had to shut it out because we had the game against Portugal three days later.”

Where Miller’s barbs strengthened McKenna’s mental resolve, learning his trade with grown men in the Juniors did the same for the physical side of his game.

“At 14 and 15 years old, I trained with Kirrie Thistle and Broughty Athletic, mainly because my dad was involved with those clubs,” McKenna continued.

“That was mainly to break up going to Aberdeen three times a week.

“They said if I came up twice, and trained locally once, that would be fine.

“It probably toughened me up. It was nowhere the level of Aberdeen, but to get that physical development at that age helped me.

“They were probably taking it easy with me being a kid but I was always trying to shove them off the ball.

“I couldn’t do it, but I would go in as hard as I could. If I went in too hard I would know all about it.

“They were more streetwise and could hurt me if they wanted – but fortunately it never really came to that.”