Ajja

An indicator of how normalised to pish I was last night I didn’t even notice us revert to back 3. I thought plan and structure seemed to dissolve around 20mins in as seems to happen these days. Jambos injury list seems to be growing. Beningime a doubt for weekend, Shankland now late March at earliest, Devlin a few weeks still, Findlay 6 weeks out and Ageu (no laughing at the back) out for season now. ……it’s the hope

Olusanya is a curious one, file under Pape Habe Gueye. Works hard but often a busy fool, he is effective in worrying defences with his pace and strength but it’s not really backed up with much control. In games where we expect to get space in behind a more aggressive press, he could be reasonably effective but that wasn’t last night. Utd flood their penalty area and shut down the channels so there was very little room to build play through those areas. We were effective when we were able to move the ball around at pace and stretch them into making errors. Just didn’t happen very often.

Just get these jumped up championship dogs back in their box in any way possible. I’m so done with them, a win at weekend would really make my month.

Exaclty as I expected as a spectacle. Suspect the pitch made the game harder than it might have looked. Utd targeted Cameron, overloading on him when he got the ball, clearly identified him as the danger. Nisbet had to spend too much time back on the halfway line foraging for possession so had to depend on Olusanya as our main outlet which isn’t ideal as he is pretty chaotic as a footballer. Geiger def didn’t have his best game, was overrun for first hour by Camara and Fata(?) but started to get a bit of a hold later on. Shinnie was good and thought McIntyre was doing pretty well before going off. Molloy is pretty solid and was obv brought in to provide some strength and defensive ability against a team of thugs but offered nothing going forward. Thought we were the only team who looked like winning and it’s a reach to say that. Not looking forward to the next two games but would be a very Aberdeen thing to do to take points in them.

Not going to be one for the purists tomorrow I suspect. Didn’t see any highlights at weekend as I was behind the couch at the vaguest mention of Scottish football but radio guys were saying the pitch looked terrible at Tannadice for Killie game. Can’t imagine it’ll have improved. I have no idea why I’m going to this but I am. It might be beer.

I’m more confident of our ability to beat either of them this season than I was last. On balance I’d prefer to face Celtic as we would have Cameron driving from midfield. ….and if it needs saying, get them out the cup/every competition going as soon as possible, always, every time, without fail.

He keeps saying no

You’ve not met my wife have you

If there is a contractual agreement wrapped around him in terms of next job and it carries significant financial return then I’d be surprised if he answered yes to that question. Suspect that Lutz has been pushing the idea that we should wait until summer as the market is poor this time of year, he has said as much. If they are looking at a strategic appointment to shape the squad long term (date I say a 3 year project ) then he will know summer is a better time. The Horneland discussion possibly presents a convenient get out. Whether it’s him or not, we are clearly waiting so we may as well get our heads down and accept it’s Leven and Doc who’ll be lifting the cup.

Yeah but imagine Jambos failing to win at Pittodrie yet again and losing the title? If Geiger grows a tash he could be a spit for Albert Kidd, 40 years later. Then we go pump Sevco 3-0 in the cup final.

What a honking list of scorers. 6 goals from our top scorer in February

One of my most enjoyable Dons experiences was at EEP as one Hans Gillhaus entered stage left. What a debut, unforgettable, what a player.

Hadn’t realised Nisbet free kick took a wee nick. Reviewing Geiger red, he deserves it for his hair do alone.

Agreed top 6 is probably a stretch now although Falkirk injury situation looks like they might struggle to keep up their results. It would be nice to make top 6 to be able to stick a spanner in the works of various teams but not sure there would be much else in it for us. Certainly would be good not to have to worry about the Dundonians/St Mirren/Killie coming up behind us. Tlg makes a good point about momentum. That’ll be essential to give us a chance at retaining our cup.

I’m the same. They’ll give us a game but we do seem to have some kind of voodoo spell over them these days.

Agreed. There are clearly aspects of their set up and play that are impressive. Getting what he is from that squad is pretty exceptional and the ability to switch players in and out often without significant reduction in quality is impressive too. They play some really good football box to box, their movement, work rate and understanding of each others positioning is also good. They struggle a bit bookending that though. Vulnerable at the back of they are pressed and not dominating possession and more crucially they don’t have a focal point up front and depend on playing through to allow Maswanhise in to score. They tried to create that focal point with the big Scandie guy but he was honking so I reckon it stuffed some of their game plan last night.

We can’t take this one for granted. Dundee are much improved despite form. Yogane will cause problems for our right side and Congreve is a decent player down the other side. Frame was good last night so hopefully he can keep the latter under wraps. Dundee have attacking threat but are pretty flaky at the back so we need to be on the front foot and get at them early. Shame we won’t have the bite and energy of Geiger or Shinnie in the middle as that’s starting to look tighter already and contained a good Motherwell side twice in a week.

Would it be rude to point out that we have lost our last 7 away games, scoring only once (Parkhead) and conceding 16? Apart from the honking form, I agree it could be a cracker and I’m buzzing for it.

Few observations rather than repeating too much of what’s already been said. Agree we are a dose of confidence off being able to compete with most sides. Game was ruined (positively for us) by the cards. I actually think that the second was given largely because the player himself (Gordon) actively goes to take Olusanya out which is a clear cycnical move and an indication of the threat. Might have tipped VAR/Beaton to think it was red (I don’t think it was). Also, and most crucially, Motherwell created nothing tonight. One slight opportunity in the box for Just and they hit the post late on but think that was flagged. They need to learn to finish if they have any aspirations for success. We didn’t look composed on the ball but as others have said that’s a confidence thing but we limited them to possession without much penetration (aided by losing players). Thought Cameron was superb and we should be doing everything to sign him.

Well are gonna have some strength to come in late in game if it’s tight. Geiger will be gassed on 60, as will Shinnie.

Can imagine fans of any club he’s linked with doing the same dance we are doing with Horneland (and several other European unknowns) ….Yeah but he won a trophy there and he had that amazing run….there’s definitely something there. Maybe he just needs a different environment etc etc

Tbh I’m pretty scunnered with it all. It’s starting to feel like them chasing shadows with Gerard/Rhol/Muscat/Rhol. Optics are honking. I’ve said previously that we are playing the risk game of trying to target managers who have done something interesting but lost their mojo somewhere (as we are with players). If we can get a tune out of one of them then it’s brilliant but so often there are valid reasons why they are available to us that don’t turn out well. It’s like we are repeatedly panning for gold. On balance, I’d probably hope we keep panning and dream of a lump of gold appearing rather than mining the talent of ‘they know the Scottish game’ and knowing that it’s likely to unearth the square root of fuck all.

Key ingredient tonight is fight. If we don’t show that we really really fucking want to defend this trophy like our lives depend upon it then there is something deep routed and endemically wrong in this squad. We just haven’t seen that kind of determination for some time. We saw it in moments in games under early Thelin but it was off the back of a confidence we would just win. I want to see that tonight. If we get first goal and are determined enough, it’s there for us.

Would normally agree but I have a little more trust on Michael Grant

Heard Michael Grant saying on BBC podcast that he has heard there are circumstances outside of the money that is potentially going to mean Horneland may not be able to come at all. He said these were no fault of either party.