Panda

Hearts had a few very good individual performances (thought McIntee looked very good for them, the type of midfielder we need) but they were just aggressive, forced mistakes, and we handed them their two goals. I don't think we walked off thinking they were miles better than us. At times when we actually got playing, individually we had a bit more about us, but look like a team that needs games. If that was a pre-season friendly I'd be thinking we showed signs of promise but need a finisher and need to be more aggressive when chasing those second balls. My worry was last week we'd be a little undercooked - fitness wise we're fine but no real rhythm to us. Easy to blame lack of friendlies, but was very little cohesion in that front three. Yengi - what I will say for him is he gets into the right positions, that's about all I can say for him. Milanovic and Aouchiche showed flashes, but neither of them hurt Hearts. Clarkson for me our best player. Great deliveries that deserved better finishes. Meh, annoying to lose to Hearts, but I don't think we're far away from still having a good season.

The goal is a series of errors. Shinnie loses it, Knoester slips allowing the first cross in, then Shinnie mis-hits the clearance and puts it into the net. We've been tidy enough in midfield, but haven't created much. Few times we've broke well on the counter and the final ball has been really poor. Hearts have won the second balls outside our box and when they do we looked panic. Shinnie is being asked to bomb forward a lot. I'd actually put Jensen over there and put on Devlin at right back. Milne also looking a bit nervous. Don't agree with the Clarkson criticism, think he's been one of our better players.

It shows, I think, an ignorance of Scottish football. Like "Why haven't You all been challenging the Old Firm, do you need me to come up and show you how it's done?" He'll soon realise there are two massive clubs we're all up against. That when you begin to put a good side together that might challenge, you very quickly find other clubs with bigger budgets coming in to snap your best players up. Bloom might find his large pit of money is emptied just trying to stave off interest from English League One clubs with bigger pockets than Hearts. Has the approach of others been poor, absolutely, and Aberdeen have underperformed for years that we only appear to slowly be trying to fix. But to win the league you essentially need to get lucky in one transfer window, surprise everyone, hope Celtic and Rangers have poor seasons, and get it right in one campaign before the vultures steal your best players at the end of the season. Even in England, the romantic Leicester City story, they haven't got close to a title again. Bloom is promising the days of a two-horse race are over and that Hearts will challenge every season. They're not even challenging for third every season.

Think the starting XI won't be too far off this. My only concern about tonight is if it's the white European strip or the granite strip. Result wise, getting more and more confident as kick-off approaches. The talking up of Hearts - much of it by Tony Bloom - is bordering on the ridiculous. They're a decent side on their day, that's all. Think a streetwise Aberdeen will win it tonight.

Great draw (presuming it's FCSB, I haven't really looked into Drita), but only if their current form continues. They had a very impressive season last campaign. Won the league & cup double (went from November until the EOS unbeaten in the league), and in Europe had some solid results such as beating PAOK three times, winning away to Qarabag, drawing away to Hoffenheim, beating Midtjylland, and making it to the last 16 of the Europa League (they did get hammered 4-0 by Rangers though - I don't actually remember that game taking place at all). On current form though, every chance Drita might do the business. I don't know if we prefer that trip or not.

Pairing 4 I think would be the one we want. FCSB (Steaua Bucharest in old money) have had a poor start to the season. Danny Armstrong (formerly of Kilmarnock) scored a hat-trick against them at the weekend in the Bucharest derby, and they were knocked out of the Champions League by losing home and away to Shkendija. Of course Drita (of Kosovo) could beat them, sure that would be a lovely trip for our Balkan lads. Clearly we want to avoid Panathinaikos who may well have found the shooting boots they lacked against Rangers.

So it is, it's the opposite way around isn't it? Aye fair enough. I've written to my MSP to request a postponement.

We'd be going into our Europa League play-off having played just one game (Celtic) if this gets called off.

God bless you Me and you are now BFFs for life.

I watched 10 minutes of his 90 minute Q&A with Hearts fans before I got bored. A lot of it appeared to be playing to the crowd. "The days of a two-horse race are over" - loud applause, etc. But I think he genuinely believes Hearts are going to pull away from the rest and be the Old Firm's equal. This is the third time in the past 26 years I can remember Hearts coming out with these statements. There was the SMG investment around 1999 that they said would mean there would be no doubt over who was now the third force. Then it was Romanov. Now this fella. Nothing wrong with a bit of ambition, but I would maybe wait until you've been in Scottish football for more than five minutes before dismissing Aberdeen, Hibs and the rest, and stating you're now up there with the Old Firm.

He played all over the place for Dundee United last season. He began the season at right midfield, was moved more centrally, and one of the games he played at left-back was in the 2-2 draw at Pittodrie.

Because that was the bigger story, and let's not lie to ourselves and pretend otherwise. No-one is talking about what a fine result that is for Motherwell. They're either laughing at Rangers, or the Rangers fans themselves are angry about it. Maybe you could have given me more than one hour to reply?

They don't. See the above explanation to Rico, the fixtures and results are generated by Opta. There's likely been an error because there are two Scottish sides in the women's champions league. It'll be fixed once it's pointed out I imagine. There's always a few teething problems at the start of a competition.

Everything is provided by Opta. The line-ups, formations, stats, league tables, everything bar the actual match report and live text.

It really should be quite the day with Hearts also playing at 3pm in Renfrewshire, and therefore their support arriving back at Glasgow central at the same time as Aberdeen, and potentially a few thousand Rangers fans kicking about ahead of their late kick-off at home to Alloa.

Tobers and Gyamfi out for "at least another two or three weeks", but everyone else fit for Hearts.

Watched both Hibs and United's games. Dundee United were really poor, but it was their second game and they've almost a new team so you presume they'll improve. Strassen were no mugs to be fair. I wish them the best of luck v Rapid Vienna (it does us no harm if United have a bit of a run). Rapid aren't the team they were a few seasons ago when they played Rangers. They were fifth last season (so, on our level maybe?) and although they did the job v Decic of Montenegro, they weren't exactly up against top opposition. As mentioned in the other thread, if United can win they would take Rapid's seeding for the play-off round. They also get to visit a cracking newish stadium. Is one for us to take inspiration from if we ever build one. A 24k capacity (28k with standing). Built nine years ago. For Hibs, they started well but faded badly, were fortunate on a few occasions, wasteful finishing from Midtylland kept them in it, managed to find an equaliser from somewhere and were hanging on for penalties. Again, with United, early in the season and that, but wasn't overly impressed with Hibs. The quality of the Ukrainian league has dipped for obvious reasons - but Oleksandria were second behind Kyiv last season and were walloped 6-0 on aggregate by Belgrade, so that's a tough one for Hibs to get through.

Aberdeen Midtylland

Yeah don't know who to believe. Previously Aberdeen have been desperately trying to shift shirts at the end of the season, so have obviously over estimated what they would sell. These are "record sales" now though and certainly I've never known us to sell out in just a few hours (I actually went on the club shop site this morning just to see if there were any more photos of the strip and was put in a 20-minute queue). We're not considered an "Elite" club by Adidas (odd, considering we're the only club on their roster who are Scottish Cup holders) so getting a restock appears to take time. If you remember the 'spezial' thing they did, the stock appeared to be really low and has never been restocked. Likewise, I wouldn't put it past us to make headlines with "record sales" and "strip sold out in hours" thing. But why make someone wait a month for a shirt they want now - in a month they might have changed their mind (or found other means). For comparison, Man Utd (who are an Adidas elite club) you can buy both strips in all sizes on their site, and likewise Celtic (elite from this season, which is odd because... I already used the Scottish Cup joke didn't I?) all three strips on their site are available in all sizes.

No, Hamrun face Maccabi in QR3, but take their seeding as the draw is made before the QR3 ties are played (Monday to be precise). Hamrun were in the Champions League and have dropped down after losing to Kyiv. Hibs and Dundee United are now big underdogs in their Conference League QR3 ties, but the one good thing for them both is they will be seeded for the play-off draw as they'll take Partizan Belgrade & Rapid Vienna's seeding respectively. There's still some very tough teams who are unseeded though so they could still end up with a Utrecht, but there are also some very winnable ties there. From what I watched tonight though both need to improve massively, especially United.

A good move for both. Would be hard to see us pairing Pape with Yengi or Lazetic (should he sign), and I think pre-season shows Boyd is perhaps the back-up for Aouchiche, so his game-time would be limited, so sell him now while his stock is high. Will be watching his semi-final header, and his turn and pass in the final accompanied by "Gueye's done quite well since coming on" for the rest of my life. Cheers Pape.

Lovely. If this is the last Dons strip with Adidas then it's a fine way to bow out. Aye they've had a few - as @RicoS321 put it - abominations. But generally we've had 83 and 90 inspired kits and it's been decent. I get the fear with some of them. Castore's kits were falling apart, Hummel I don't like the arrows on the sleeves which Hearts & Killie are stuck with. Nike - surprising considering they're a big name - a lot of their strips look cheap. Joma have produced some awful Hibs strips. Puma I'd accept (although that would be a kick in the baws to Adidas), I liked some of the strips we had with them previously and they've been producing some very decent ones for PSV. Umbro have been making a comeback and have a long association with the Dons. Also, don't know if it was just someone making up a rumour, but someone said we were possibly going with Mizuno. Not seen or heard anything else about that, but that would be interesting as their golf gear is of high quality. They're quite new to the club football market - Lazio, Monaco, a few smaller German clubs and their own Japanese market appear to be all they produce for.

Unless we're signing a new deal, then this is the last season we'll be with Adidas, so I suppose they have to milk every last drop out of it. I'm pretty sure I read Aberdeen saying they were getting a new batch of 'north-sea' kits in, then after that there would no more restock, so fairly soon that strip won't even be on sale.

This usually means the launch of a new shirt, so likely a third one ahead of Tynecastle on Monday. The 'granite strip' was only released in September so isn't even a year old yet (although I'll let them off as we did wear it quite often and we probably need this strip registered in time for Europe). The black and gold one, which was heralded so much, was only worn four times - the women's team did at least essentially make it their home shirt which I think is a good thing. Hopefully this one is just plain white without the gimmicks. "It's got green in it to represent broad hill, and the light brown is to represent the sand at the beach". Or it may not be a strip at all, and could just be them getting a new batch of mugs in. I did notice they had run out of the cup final mugs and have been waiting patiently for more.