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Are we all being whooshed here?

Thistle saying had it not been for landing a Scottish Cup tie at Ibrox - which earned them £300,000 - they wouldn't have been able to pay the players wages.

Aye but Scotland haven't qualified, and England have a right good chance of winning it, so probably best to pretend that isn't happening.

First European game 24 August. First league game 5 August. Apart from the covid season, this will be the longest summer without seeing the Dons competitively since McInnes' first season. No men's World Cup or Euros to keep us going either. This is terrible. Maybe we should rethink finishing third in future.

I wonder now with Ange leaving Celtic if that affects our chances of getting Liam Scales on a permanent. New manager might want to take a look at him or even give him a chance. He's not exactly irreplaceable, or as integral as a Clarkson or Shinnie, but would have been nice to get a left sided centre back that is a known quantity signed up.

Improved atmosphere is a big thing, but also the prize for finishing third is so much bigger now that it's not as depressing starting the season feeling third is the highest you can finish.

Dundee United. I remember that game well. To be fair we were the better team but lost 2-1. The feeling was that we had turned the corner though, only to promptly lose 7-0 to Celtic, before beating Motherwell 6-5. Mental times really.

You've misunderstood me. I don't follow English football so don't care what fans of Bournemouth and Chesterfield think of Scottish football. But Tottenham are a big club. And a manager going to them and doing well reflects well on Scottish football, and let's other managers see that the Scottish Premiership is a good stepping stone. I only ever spoke to Ange once, over zoom, so hold no real opinion of him. But there's been far more dislikable Celtic managers than him I'd say. Good luck to him, especially if he weakens Celtic by taking Kyogo, Jota and Carter-Vickers with him.

Hope Postecoglou does well down in England as it reflects well on our game, but I fear he wont. He plays an exciting brand of football, but when the real tests have come in Europe he's failed, repeatedly. For me, before he was considered a top manager he had to go and make a mark in Europe next season and fend off what is likely to be a top Aberdeen team next season, and he's walked away before he can. Don't know what's considered a decent first season at Tottenham. I'd suggest top six, but then Mourinho finished sixth, had Tottenham in first place and into a cup final, and was sacked when they fell to seventh. Conte finished fourth, then sacked when they were in sixth.

This will seem a strange choice, but the 3-0 League Cup final defeat to Celtic in the 16/17 season. Performance wise we were really poor, didn't really turn up and were easily turned over. But my main memory was how quiet the support was. Just very few making an effort. I was in amongst many of the old Red Ultras boys and every chant we tried to get going failed, no-one was interested. And it also hit home at the time how few chants we actually had. Was just a really depressing day. I never thought I'd ever leave a cup final early but we walked out with 15/20 mins to go just fed up. It didn't feel like we were in a cup final at all. Felt like all the life had been sucked out of us. I've been at all but one of every single shocker - Stenhousemuir, Darvel, Queen of the South, Skonto Riga, Bohemians, both 7-0s to Celtic and the 9-0, and the 6-1 (?) to Livingston. If I'm missing any others, chances are I was there. Think the only one I've missed was the defeat to Queen's Park. But I knew after every one of those that it was a shite result but in time we'd bounce back because we always do. But that day at Hampden I felt so disenchanted with everything. A few months later we were totally different in the Scottish Cup in terms of performance and atmosphere. And these days I think our support might be the best it's ever been, and huge credit to Ultras Aberdeen for that.

The Tories really have broken you haven't they?

I don't see CSKA Sofia on that list (they could actually be Bulgarian champions today). Inverness v Juventus, while we're sat at home thinking about that defeat to Darvel, is a bleak future. Although, I do like the thought of Tottenham trying to unveil Ange to a disgruntled support days after he's lost a cup final to Inverness.

Yeh sorry, the Slavia Prague & Olympiakos threw me off before realising it was the previous round where their ties are pretty much fixed already. So aye, could be anyone from pot 3 or 4.

Interesting explainer here of how the Europa League play-off would work and possible opponents should it be us in there. If you don't have time to read that entire thread (it's 17 tweets) then the short version appears to be, if I've read it right, that we'll play one of the teams from priority group 3, all of which I would say are winnable games.

"After such a crap first half of the year, to go and get a win like that where we didn’t just beat Rangers, we battered them, was what I needed.” Love this. I suppose the interview didn't really say anything unexpected. He knows he's too good to sit on the bench and another loan spell is pointless if they're not going to give him a chance when he comes back. Suspect he'll be this summer's will he/won't he's Connor Ronan.

Aberdeen not taking up the option to sign Myslovic permanently. After seeing how hopeless he was against Darvel, that's no surprise.

Playing Charlton down in London on 29 July. Don't usually bother with pre-season friendlies, but that one could be interesting. Also going to Portugal for a week long training camp (Aberdeen are, not me). "More friendlies to be announced" - I imagine once the League Cup draw is made we can pick up teams who have a free date.

If you wish to allow yourselves to dream about the group stage, then here are the projected group seedings based on who is likely to qualify, and the favourites all progressing through the qualifying rounds (these will of course change a lot). We'll likely be in Pot 4 no matter what group stage we went into. EUROPA LEAGUE EUROPA CONFERENCE LEAGUE

If Inverness win the cup, the above is the current list of teams we could face (like Hearts and Hibs we'd be unseeded, although we do have a slightly higher coefficient than them, 8.000). If Celtic win the cup, it's a bit more complicated, but the Here We Go podcast boys have predicted it based on current league tables as:-

If Celtic don't win the cup on Saturday, therefore meaning we're not guaranteed group stage football, then we may not be able to afford Clarkson, Shinnie, Scales, Pollock, Tierney and McTominay. Likewise, it does make Aberdeen a less attractive proposition without the money and group stage football. C'mon Celtic, do It for Barry. You owe him.

Stephen Glass.

Agree we need a left back/left wing back. We need someone better than Ramadani. We need Scales, Shinnie and Clarkson. It's not the right time to sell Duk. We could be playing group stage football against clubs with big bank balances. Let him shine on that stage and maximise what we can get for him.

Aye, was a pretty miserable 90 minutes. All five goals, the goalscorer is unmarked. Two from free headers, two from no-one reacting to get to a rebound, and the other (the first goal) because McKenzie is caught out of position, then lunges into a challenge when there was already a player covering, meaning he gets turned inside out. Hayes and McKenzie were constantly cut apart with through balls, neither of them knowing who was meant to be marking the man. Hayes should know better. McKenzie, he played like a player who has spent most of the season either injured or on the bench, and is then thrown into a game away to Celtic because the first choice LCB is ineligible. He needs more game time before being given that type of test. Going forward, the crossing was abysmal, only one decent ball I can think of which was from a Hayes corner which Bain punched away. To answer your question, yeh I can't remember any shots at goal. But that's actually three games now (all in a row) where we haven't had a single shot on target against Celtic.

Dundee United's admin working overtime here.

Just realised we only lost 2-0 on the opening day. I always thought that was a 3 or 4 nil scudding. Halcyon days.