Jamie Langfield may be approaching the veteran stage of his career, but the Aberdeen goalkeeper reckons he is getting better with age.
The 33-year-old, pictured below, has six clean sheets from 11 starts in all competitions this season.
Langfield, who joined Aberdeen in 2005, achieved another shut-out on Saturday against Dundee United, making a vital stop to thwart David Goodwillie with Calvin Zola’s second-half goal enough to secure three points.
He said: “I’m really enjoying my football and manager Derek McInnes and his assistant Tony Docherty have instilled a lot of confidence in me.
“They brought in Nicky Weaver during the summer who is an experienced goalkeeper, but they are happy with me.
“I work my socks off in training every day to show I want to be here and I want to play for them.
“Hopefully people see that, but I know when quality goalkeepers such as Nicky come in people will be saying I have to watch my back, but I just keep my head down and work as hard as I can.
“The aim is to stick in the manager’s mind, but when I was making mistakes in the past I think they were getting blown out of proportion. These things happen, but you just go on and I have a confidence about myself at the moment.
“As a goalkeeper you always get better with age, but I know if something does go wrong Nicky will be straight in so I need to play well to keep him out of the team.”
Willo Flood and Barry Robson, who came on as a second-half substitute, both returned from injury to help defeat their former side and Langfield was pleased to see the midfield duo back on the pitch.
He said: “It’s brilliant to have them back because you could see the quality, although the youngsters have done well.”
Aberdeen manager Derek McInnes has given former Dundee United and Watford midfielder Prince Buaben, now a free agent, training facilities with the Dons.
McInnes said: “He trained for a day last week and we invited him in on Saturday to do a bit of work and come to the game. I am surprised he doesn’t have a club as he has quality.
“He has asked if he can use the training facilities and we are happy to do that.”