Panda

I was actually at the Killie-Hearts game. Went with a couple of Killie mates.

Findlay Curtis (on loan from Rangers) is a very good player. David Watson good on the other side too. But really, Killie were average and Hearts just poor.

Was some scrapping after the game in the streets. Didn't seem to be police anywhere.

It's taken me to the 70th minute to notice Falkirk don't have any shirt sponsors, which is unusual.

Subs: Looks like Robinson wanted more energy, but it's come at the cost of any creativity. 

I'd take off Morrison and put on Nelson. He can step into the midfield and give us a bit more control in there. We just look a little short in the middle at times.

Geiger the new Lee Richardson in that he's being targeted by the referees? He's getting thumped about that midfield and not getting any free-kicks.

We've stopped Falkirk playing, which might seem negative but in our current state is what we need to do. Their only threat is shots from the edge of the box, but generally we're defending in numbers, have defended set pieces well, and haven't been opened up on the break which we often have been this season.

Going forward, Lazetic is working his socks off but nothing happening for him. We've not really got Nisbet into the game. 

But, this is like an Aberdeen-St Mirren game, but in this instance we're St Mirren/Falkirk, where we'd be struggling to break down the opposition before being hit with a sucker punch.

Looks like a 3-5-2. Surprised to see Lazetic start, but I'm also hopeful Robinson can pull something out of him that we've not seen yet (besides that goal in Paisley).

Bratveit fit again but Mitov starts. Cameron benched another surprise, but can see why Robinson would prefer Armstrong.

This story is hilarious (although, a few months of stress for the poor bloke involved). Basically an Aberdeen fan got charged with assault for singing Stand Free.

My favourite part:-

His daughter Lauren gave an example of the fists-out gesture to the court and sang a line from the Stand Free chant.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crm89w9yeyno

Robinson has been mainly playing 3-5-2 this season, and wouldn't be surprised if he does that in his first game. He's also played 3-5-2 in both games v Falkirk this season - a 2-1 away win, and a 2-0 home defeat (although they had seven players injured for the second one).

I also think Shinnie will start as he'll want his captain in there for the first game. Olusanya is his man so likely starts too (although Lazetic did score a glorious goal against St Mirren).

My prediction (I presume there's no suspensions/injuries I've missed):-

1 hour ago, OrlandoDon said:

Is there any substance to the chatter about lutz leaving, fired etc? 

Lutz was quoted in the club's statement so he's not left, and Robinson's title is head coach rather than manager, which again suggests there'll be a sporting director above him. Leven/Doc away I believe. 
 

Just watched the RedTV piece on his first day. Appears Robinson got all the staff together - the non football side - to introduce himself and give a speech. Comes across a quite impressive and very likeable.

Fuck it, I've never loved an Aberdeen manager as much as Robbo. We're gonna win everything, then win it all again.

16 minutes ago, tlg1903 said:

Just saw on Fb apparently the club is in dispute with the BBC? 

 

"came here to ask the same question. 
on BBC scotland they said they could only show reports from Redtv as dispute between afc and BBC" 

First I've heard of it

@Panda  can you offer any insight? 

It's true, yes, but I don't think I can say anything else, as much as I'd love to.

Hopefully just a temporary thing. 

If Leven & Docherty have left, be interesting to see if that was a Robinson decision, a board decision, or if they left of their own accord (Docherty was only in a temporary role anyway, so I'm thinking more about Leven).

2 hours ago, Bukta Bertie said:

I don't like the Irish people full stop.

I'm half Irish.

No offence taken though as you're clearly a few fries short of a happy meal.

Not sure Lutz has been undermined here considering we were interested in Robinson two months ago, and Lutz began the process by saying he wanted someone with knowledge of Scottish football. But I guess it'll all come out over the next few months.

I think we all know Robinson wasn't the first choice. Horneland obviously fell through for "unforeseen circumstances". Cormack mentioning Schwarz last week in an interview wasn't helpful, but the kind of brain fart we've come to expect from our dear leader.

Currently watching his YouTube interview and my enthusiasm for him is waning due to the amount of times he says "football club".

Not a good start to his tenure. Expected better than this.

It's done, announcement coming very soon. Dave is currently writing and rewriting the statement, trying to convince everyone that Robinson fits the board's philosophy of delivering exciting, attacking football and that he was the number one choice from the very start.

He's here now. Wasn't my first choice but I also don't think he's anywhere near as bad as some people are making out. The anger should be with the club rather than Robinson.

I would expect he'll be announced in the morning (presuming everything has gone smoothly, which with us recently is no guarantee).

Absolutely no reason for him to have to wait until summer. McInnes left Kilmarnock for Hearts last season.

Be interesting to see his managerial team. Would Docherty stay as assistant having been a manager against Robinson previously? 

1 hour ago, irnbru1903 said:

 he employs Jim Goodwin mark 2. 

Is he though?

Under Goodwin, St Mirren finish 9th and 7th, and although he left them in sixth he never completed the season (they finished 9th). Best they did in either cup was a semi-final.

Robinson was his direct replacement, and in each of his full seasons they have finished 6th, 5th, 6th (their first top six finishes since 1985), won the League Cup and will be leaving them in the Scottish Cup semis. They qualified for Europe for the first time in 37 years.

This is his first poor season in the league as manager, and can be attributed to injuries and yeah, poor signings. But they've still won a cup and did it by beating four Premiership teams on the way, including Hearts, and thumping Motherwell and Celtic.

And that doesn't mention his record at Motherwell too, which ranks above Goodwin at both Dundee United and Aberdeen.

I totally accept the negativity towards his appointment and that many of us expected something else, but he is a significantly better manager than Jim Goodwin. 

I've nothing against Stephen Robinson personally. I think he's a decent manager, and given a good squad he absolutely can be a successful Aberdeen manager.

He's also a more successful manager than everyone we've appointed since McInnes, and as of now has also won the same number of trophies as McInnes. He also led St Mirren & Motherwell to a combined three cup finals, just one fewer than McInnes at Aberdeen, which is probably a bigger achievement when you consider the budgets.

My annoyance is us once again abandoning a long term strategy because we can't make up our fucking minds what to do. We also could have appointed him two months ago and potentially still salvaged the season.

I don't know if the Lutz leaving rumours are true, but if they are then that's another shit show to deal with. At the moment I have little confidence in us having a squad next season that will be good enough for Robinson to get anything out of.

On 09/03/2026 at 08:02, Bukta Bertie said:

Another once Dons legend that eventually revealed himself to be an uber hun. McLeish. 

What has Alex McLeish got to do with that image?

1 hour ago, Bukta Bertie said:

 

I understand the Scottish nationalist agenda many of you clearly follow so I know what's behind your wilful ignorance on the matter but if you could just try and park (to run with the laboured car metaphor) the insular, xenophobic thinking for even a moment you'd realise that I'm right. 

Your determination to derail every thread by saying the same thing over and over again, and then insulting anyone who disagrees with your opinion, got boring a long time ago.

6 hours ago, Bukta Bertie said:

In Scotland it isn't difficult.

Any club that isn't Aberdeen, dundee, dundee united, hibs, hearts celtic or rangers.

Typical weegie media tripe.

8 hours ago, Blow.Up.Sheep said:

I know i was laughed at and slagged all over the place when said that we should have appointed Neil Lennon to replace McInnes. I am not saying we would be league and european champions if we had done that back then, but we would most certianly not be in the dreadful sinking shit show that we are currently in the middle of if we had.

I don't think Lennon is any better than McInnes (and, we should have been upgrading on McInnes, Thelin the only man we've appointed since who at least had a background and CV to suggest he may have been).

What really goes against him is all the baggage that comes with him. I'd find it difficult to accept him as manager and I like to think I'm one of the less reactionary fans.

He's going a good job at Dunfermline and fair play to him, but he's not what we need. He's a chequebook manager, a Celtic Jimmy Calderwood if you like. Give him a good squad and he might get them playing, but at Celtic he frustrated all the coaches because he had zero interest in the youth team and no desire to ever promote anyone. At Hibs he inherited a good team and as they broke up he couldn't fix it or rebuild, he left them in eighth. And he absolutely blew Celtic's chances of 10 in a row.

I won't lose any sleep over us not appointing Lennon.

6 hours ago, Blow.Up.Sheep said:

I don't think anyone anywhere can actually class the result as a cup upset,

I can, I was upset.

3 hours ago, OrlandoDon said:

 

just because doc failed in other places does mean he can’t coach and lead.

But there's no evidence he's capable, so why make such a drastic change and hang our hopes on a guy that has just had a disastrous spell at Ross County?

We'd actually be better bringing Neil fucking Warnock back.

3 hours ago, OrlandoDon said:

McGhee is a good example too, was awful with us but had success elsewhere, hence he was also considered for the Celtic job.

I'm beginning to worry about you. Aberdeen have broken you.

1 hour ago, OrlandoDon said:

Pretty sure that happens in the summer,

But again, why does it need to happen in the summer? 

Why go to the lengths or rearranging the interim team, again, rather than appointing a new manager?

We were holding interviews in January. We've all but made public our interest in two men. And yet we're discussing if we should change the interim team because we don't think we can appoint a manager for another three months.

1 hour ago, OrlandoDon said:

how could doc be worse?

Because he won just twice in 13 games at Ross County, including a 6-0 defeat in his final game. 

Now, County have their issues (as do we) but there's no evidence there he is capable of doing any better than Leven with the current group of players.

"He's experienced". Aye, so is Mark McGhee.