This from the Scotsman:

 

No Kingston! (Suspended) Bednar, Pinilla, & Aguiar are out with injuries.  Hearts are depleted.

 

Byrne is still recovering for a hamstring operation and is our only absentee.

 

Teams:

 

Aberdeen (from): Soutar, Hart, Diamond, Touzani, D Smith, Considine, Mair, McNamara, Severin, Nicholson, Clark, Foster, Young, J Smith, De Visscher, Lovell, Mackie, Miller, Brewster.

 

Hearts (from): Banks, Kurskis, Berra, Karipidis, Zaliukas, Goncalves, Wallace, Mikoliunas, Tall, McCann, Driver, Pospisil, Velicka, Beniusis, Cesnauskis, Neilson, Elliot, Palazuelos, Ksanavicius, Jonsson, Makela, Stewart.

 

 

 

I'd go with

 

Soutar

Hart      Diamond    Mair    Foster

Mackie  Severin    Nicholson    JdV

    Miller      Lovell

 

with Langfield; Considine; D Smith; J Smith; McNamara; Maguire, and; Brewster on the bench.

 

However, the tangoman will probably go with something along the lines of

 

Soutar

Hart    Diamond    Severin    Forster

J Smith    McNamara      Clark      Nicholson

  Brewster    Miller

Soutar

Diamond

Hart_______Mair

Severin

Mackie_________________De Visscher

McNamara_____Nicholson

Miller___________Lovell

I'd go with

 

Soutar

Hart      Diamond     Mair     Foster

Mackie   Severin    Nicholson     JdV

    Miller      Lovell

 

Just noticed that seven of your preferred starting eleven are what we may class as regular goal scorers. Quite impressed with that lineup, and it bemuses me as to how we lost last week! Really, we should've knocked half a dozen past Yooshited. Ho-hum!

I'd go with

 

Soutar

Hart      Diamond    Mair    Foster

Mackie  Severin    Nicholson    JdV

    Miller      Lovell

 

Just noticed that seven of your preferred starting eleven are what we may class as regular goal scorers. Quite impressed with that lineup, and it bemuses me as to how we lost last week! Really, we should've knocked half a dozen past Yooshited. Ho-hum!

 

If we had better quality of ball in to the box from wide positions we probably would have.  Though we still would have had to get past their keeper, who looked very good - too good for them.

If we had better quality of ball in to the box from wide positions we probably would have.  Though we still would have had to get past their keeper, who looked very good - too good for them.

 

Again, this beggars belief as to why JDV was left on the bench. He was signed to solve our wing problems, and then Tangoman goes and leave him on the bench for the majority of our first game of the competitive season! :wheres-the-shrug-smiley-when-you-need-it?:

Again, this beggars belief as to why JDV was left on the bench. He was signed to solve our wing problems, and then Tangoman goes and leave him on the bench for the majority of our first game of the competitive season! :wheres-the-shrug-smiley-when-you-need-it?:

 

And, apparently, he has been left out for tomorrows game as well.  Oh, and Severin in playing in defence, again, tomorrow. 

If there's ever a time to give Hearts a doing its today.

 

The tactical tombola (©TRA) stipulates that preferred result is a secondary consideration to "giein' ivraywan a shoat aw aboot the pitch, no?"

 

So we'll probably start:

Soutar

Hart Severin Diamond Foster

Nicholson McNamara Clark JDV

          Miller Lovell

 

And at half time it'll be:

Miller

JDV Foster Lovell Nicholson

Diamond Hart Severin McNamara

        Clark Soutar

Pish pish pish pish pish pish pish pish pishing pish.  >

 

This is going to be a long season. Diamond, Jackie Mac and Soutar are the only ones who get pass marks from me. Foster, Clark and Mackie look like they've caught Diamond's "I've made it so i don't have to bother being any good any more" attitude from a while back. In fact, no, Foster, Clark and Mackie look to be as pish as we've always suspected they are.

 

Why we started with 2 players who can only play effectively with either decent through balls to run onto or a target man beside them (Lovell and Mackie), then proceeded to hoof it up to them is beyond me. Then, after 10 minutes, even though we're "a better team than Hearts" (quote from every Sunday paper coourtesy of rent a gob Jimmy), we had to adjust our tactics to stop them playing us off the park, leaving lovell up on his own, with Mackie and Clark hiding from the ball out wide in case they were asked to do something with it.

 

Finally, if you don't shoot, you don't score. This most basic of things should be drummed into our players. Clark and Mackie today's main offenders in the "lay it off to someone in case i make an arse of my shot and get booed" category.

I couldna make the game even though I was up north due to my sick granny. I met some of my mates after the game in Archies and after I had heard the result from thechimp saying we were pish. All the dons fans in archies had a dejected face on them and on seeing each other shook thier heads in disbelief at how bad we were. It was like we had lost 3,4-0 and after everybody say how shit we were, how confused abody was by the tactial tombola (at least 8 formations), one up front, seve at the back, etc etc I understood.

 

The worring bit is that abody was petrified at what the score will be next week - people fearing a ebbe era scoreline if the same performance was delivered.

I couldna make the game even though I was up north due to my sick granny. I met some of my mates after the game in Archies and after I had heard the result from thechimp saying we were pish. All the dons fans in archies had a dejected face on them and on seeing each other shook thier heads in disbelief at how bad we were. It was like we had lost 3,4-0 and after everybody say how shit we were, how confused abody was by the tactial tombola (at least 8 formations), one up front, seve at the back, etc etc I understood.

 

The worring bit is that abody was petrified at what the score will be next week - people fearing a ebbe era scoreline if the same performance was delivered.

 

Fuck, you've nailed it. Ebbe-era, that was what today reminded me of. With added tactical lucky dipping.

aye, it was crap. but we're overplaying this tactical thing. granted, mair's no left back and there's no doubt we miss severin in midfield. but other than that, it was pretty much a standard 4-4-2, which is what everyone has been shouting for.

 

for what it's worth, i thought smith had an excellent first half before doing nowt in the second - much more like it from the wee fella. diamond went a long way towards repairing his reputation and jackie mac was by some stretch the best player on the park.

 

however - clark remains a one-trick pony (how much of a joy must he be to play against?) and lovell was truly terrible. if anyone here was one of the plonkers booing when he was substituted, you need to take a right good look at yourselves - he was dreadful.

 

mackie still doesn't look up to speed, but at least he looked willing. could've stood brewster's quality about 10 minutes earlier (maguire didn't add a terrific amount when he came on - brew would've been a much better option at the time).

 

still, going by the first hour of the sellic game against the bairns, not much to fear. calm doon chaps.

 

 

Going 1 up front after going 1-0 up yesterday was unbelievable. Where did JC get this reputation as an attacking manager? Hearts were there for the taking but were far to negative in our outlook to take advantage.

 

Cannot see why everyone is raving about Jackie Mac. Apart from giving the ball away for the goal I cannot remember him doing anything yesterday apart from pass the ball sideways or backwards.

 

Lastly long balls to a lone striker against two 6ft plus monsters why?

 

Thankfully I will not be here for the Celtic game as off on holiday tonight for a week as I can see Celtic giving us a right going over.

Gotta remember that we always get up for a match V the OF.  The lads know they need to get a start.  According to the stats from yesterday's game we had the lion's share of play.  Just couldn't get the 2nd goal.

 

Though I would have liked the win, I'll take the point.

Going 1 up front after going 1-0 up yesterday was unbelievable. Where did JC get this reputation as an attacking manager? Hearts were there for the taking but were far to negative in our outlook to take advantage.

 

Cannot see why everyone is raving about Jackie Mac. Apart from giving the ball away for the goal I cannot remember him doing anything yesterday apart from pass the ball sideways or backwards.

 

Lastly long balls to a lone striker against two 6ft plus monsters why?

 

Thankfully I will not be here for the Celtic game as off on holiday tonight for a week as I can see Celtic giving us a right going over.

 

you need to decide what you want here, chief. jackie mac clearly tries to play a bit of fitba, hence the passing the ball about in midfield. if you want a degree more urgency, you get this lumping the ball up the park to the strikers business, which hasn't worked in the last two games (and is horrible to watch anyway).

 

me, i'd take jackie's more thoughtful reading of the game any day of the week, even if it doesn't produce immediate fireworks.

 

regarding the negativity of the game after we scored, i'm not sure this is all jc's fault. he's not going to try to sit on a one-nil lead for 75 minutes, irrespective of how deserved that lead was. i get the feeling the players aren't exactly doing what he's asking them.

 

and the fact that we had three strikers on the bench says quite a lot about jc's attitude to attack. he's not exactly gung ho these days, a fact we should all be thankful for.

 

we'll get better. sellic will get turned over on wednesday and will be knackered by the time we take 'em to the cleaners on sunday. you mark my words.

 

 

 

 

Trying to find that bit about why didn't JC play De Visscher...

 

Found this on Sporting Life:

The Dons boss, who lost Jeffrey de Visscher and Andrew Considine to training-ground injuries, felt his players had let Hearts back into the game.

 

you need to decide what you want here, chief. jackie mac clearly tries to play a bit of fitba, hence the passing the ball about in midfield. if you want a degree more urgency, you get this lumping the ball up the park to the strikers business, which hasn't worked in the last two games (and is horrible to watch anyway).

 

me, i'd take jackie's more thoughtful reading of the game any day of the week, even if it doesn't produce immediate fireworks.

 

regarding the negativity of the game after we scored, i'm not sure this is all jc's fault. he's not going to try to sit on a one-nil lead for 75 minutes, irrespective of how deserved that lead was. i get the feeling the players aren't exactly doing what he's asking them.

 

and the fact that we had three strikers on the bench says quite a lot about jc's attitude to attack. he's not exactly gung ho these days, a fact we should all be thankful for.

 

we'll get better. sellic will get turned over on wednesday and will be knackered by the time we take 'em to the cleaners on sunday. you mark my words.

 

 

 

 

 

Sadly, Jimmy's in the papers today saying that going one up top to allow us to cope with them was exactly what he did order us to do as Hearts weren't really causing us a lot of problems but were seeing a lot of the ball in midfield.

 

Have to say, i thought Jackie Mac was one of our 2 or 3 better performers yesterday. He did give the ball away for the goal, but i thought he was being pushed as he was trying to clear it, leading to a rushed pass to Clark, who in turn also got fouled. Other than that, i thought he used it very intelligently, far better than almost any other player on the park and i wouldn't think he'll have just panicked and hoofed it up front to nobody too many times.

 

My biggest wish is that JC would give Miller and Lovell a few games to play alongside each other. Neither Mackie nor Lovell can play well unless we're either a) playing it on the deck to feet/to run onto or b) if there's a big lumbering target man alongside them to win the aerial balls and do the aforementioned threading through of balls. Mackie's got the control of a virgin in a brothel, and Brewster's hardly the future of our team. I rate Miller, and think he's the physical presence we need up front.