This Sunday sees the Aberdeen U17s (2003’s) take on Rangers in the final of the Club Academy Scotland Cup. With the season wrapping up for most of the squad in November, the youth academies across Scotland opted to create a competition for the teams to run alongside the U18 league due to the change to summer football, culminating in the final, which The Dons and Rangers will meet in.

The Dons won the Scottish Cup in November after defeating Hearts 1-0 in the final at Balmoral Stadium and there are a number of players from that squad who will travel to the Hummel Training Centre on the outskirts of Glasgow to face the young Gers.

Ahead of the final, manager Scott Anderson spoke with the AFC Media team.

“It’s been a beneficial competition as with the academies moving to summer football we’ve managed to get games into a lot of the boys, with some turning out for the U18s as well as playing in the cup.

“It’s also been beneficial because it’s allowed us to make decisions on some of the boys going forward. It’s a tight group and they will be the ones who will go onto become full time or schoolboys at under 18.

Aberdeen were initially drawn in a group of five with Inverness CT, St Johnstone, Motherwell and Alloa, facing each side both home and away. The top two from each group went through to the quarter-final with The Dons seeing off the challenge of Hamilton Accies, with an emphatic 6-2 win.

Last week’s semi-final was a much tighter affair against Kilmarnock with a narrow 1-0 victory to set up Sunday’s showdown with Rangers and Scott knows his side will have to raise the game against the side, who’s academy won the SFA Youth Cup last week.

“It’s a good way for this group to sign off as it will be their last game together. To reach the final again is credit to them and have done well over the course of the last four or five months. It’s been tough going, but it’s a great chance to win another cup and get ready for the next stage.

“Certainly, over the last couple of seasons Rangers have been the benchmark at youth level in Scotland. They’ve been getting a lot of good results of late and a lot of this team were in the side that won over in Dubai recently.

“Our academy have been doing great things as well, with the U15s going on a brilliant run in Portugal

Good luck to the young Dons on Sunday and lets hope the trophy returns to the Pittodrie cabinet!