RONNY DEILA'S insistence Celtic will go on to win their fifth successive league title this season has cut no ice with Derek McInnes, the manager of Ladbrokes Premiership leaders, Aberdeen.
McInnes, whose side exited the League Cup against Hibs at Easter Road in midweek, believes the Celtic manager is right to express his confidence in his team, but he took a swipe at Deila by adding that every manager in the league would make such a claim with the playing budget of the Parkhead club.
"We just concentrate on ourselves,” McInnes said on the eve of Aberdeen’s trip to face Inverness Caledonian Thistle in today’s Highland battle.
“I know what he said, but any manager in our league would be confident in saying something like that given the level of finances Celtic has when the rest of us are working on budgets of between £1m and £2m and they're working with £20m.
"I have no problem with what he said.
“Every manager has to concentrate on their own team and we're no different.
"We need to analyse why we lost the Hibs game but the good thing is that come Thursday morning, we turned our thoughts to Inverness.
“It's about how we react to the defeat and that has never been an issue for us.
"The Inverness game is always competitive. We'll have 3000 fans there and it's always a big thing for Inverness when we go there and we'll have two good teams fighting for every advantage.
"We'll have our work cut out against a team that is improving and going the right way under John Hughes."
Jonny Hayes, who missed the midweek game at Easter Road because of suspension, will return to action to face his former club at the Caledonian Stadium as the Pittodrie side aim to put their League Cup upset behind them.
The Irish winger is one of four former Inverness players in the Aberdeen ranks and he revealed that he played a part in persuading two – Adam Rooney and Graeme Shinnie – to continue their careers under McInnes.
“I played my part in getting them to Aberdeen,” he said, “as I spoke to them and helped persuade them to come.
“There were a few Inverness fans who weren’t happy when I came to Aberdeen, but nothing can be done about that now.
“Having a couple of ex-Inverness players here will maybe be a bit frustrating for their fans but as soon as Aberdeen came in for me that was the place I knew I wanted to go and I have been happy ever since.
“They have some good footballers but, in my opinion, we now have their best one [Shinnie] on our side now and hopefully that will help us." Shinnie and Willo Flood were removed early in the cup-tie against Hibs because of injury and both will be unavailable for today’s game with the latter ruled out for anything up to six weeks.
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