Aberdeen manager Derek McInnes is confident his team can deliver a winning semi-final performance, despite the Dons support being vastly outnumbered at Hampden on Saturday.
Championship winners Hibernian have already sold more than 17,000 tickets for the final four encounter and expect to sell close to their full allocation of around 21,000 by the weekend.
The Dons, by contrast, who were also given an allocation around 21,000 have shifted around 11,500 tickets with the early 12.15pm kick-off time off putting some Aberdeen supporters off making the journey to the national stadium.
In comparison, the Dons sold out their 20,000 allocation for their 2015 League Cup semi-final against Dundee United when the game kicked off at 3pm.
But there will be a bigger crowd at Hampden than when Aberdeen defeated Morton 2-0 in the semi-finals of the League Cup in October in front of 16,183 spectators.
Aberdeen manager Derek McInnes said: “The semi-final when it is at Hampden can be a bit diluted if the crowd isn’t there.
“Everybody has their reasons for that and hopefully the supporters turn out in good numbers.
“I think we had sold 11,000 by last week which was good going considering it is a three hour journey for the majority of those who will be going.
“Whether we sell loads more or just a little more, for us the importance of the game will be clear with the objective to get to the final.
“It would be nice to have more there but it’s not the most important thing.”
The Aberdeen manager has opted against taking his squad away this week to prepare for the semi-final, instead opting for a ‘business as usual’ training week in Aberdeen in preparation for the biggest game of the club’s season since November’s League Cup final with Celtic that ended in a 3-0 defeat.
McInnes said: “We’ve tried both. We’ve went away in the build-up to finals before but normally for semi-finals we’ve just kept it as we normally do and train in Aberdeen.
“That kind of familiarity has been good for us in the past.
“We just want to take our league form into the cup games and nothing really changes.
“We’ll treat it like a normal away game.”