First game back and an important one at that.  Need to make sure that second spot is ours as there are still plenty of points to be won.  I'd like to see us start with both Rooney and Shankland to see what he can do starting.  Would seem ridiculous not to given he's scored 26 goals for the development league. 

 

Form for last 5 games:

 

Dons: WWLWD

Jags: LWLWW

 

In / out: Out

Pre matcher: Lunch with the folks

Match:  Hopefully home listening to the game

Post matcher:  A few pints in the local

Prediction: 2-0 Dons, Shankland and McGinn

Agree with comments about giving Shankland a run. Surely this is the sort of game to play him in. With little to play for we are not really risking that much by giving him a run of games.

 

In / oot: In

Pre matcher: Archies

Match:  Y

Post matcher:  Meal with in laws in town

Prediction: 3-0 Rooney Double and McGinn

 

Aye, time for a Shankland shot.  The international form and experience, coupled with his youth team form and contribution with limited game time thus far have all suggested he's got huge potential.  Time to take it up a gear.

 

Also hope Low gets a chance before the season end.  He's been really unlucky with injury this year.  We may just have moved on a notch from him now but he's a capable player in the SPL.

Out

EPL on TV

Online

?

2-0 to Aberdeen Shankland (2)

Out

Golfing

Golfing

Still probably on the course

3-1 (Rooney, Hayes & Shankland  )

Interesting team selection issues for Derek on Saturday.

Goodie clearly hasn't been producing the goods

Shankland continues not to only knock on the door but batter the fucking living daylights out of it, oh and a certain contender for POTY is back and fit for selection.

 

Nice to have options to choose from.

I'll also be intrigued to see if DM actually makes the subs a bit earlier if things aren't going our way.  Still stumps me as to why he keeps faith in the team until the last few minutes.

 

Low looks like a beast when he plays, have been very impressed by him every time he's played.  As Stooge says, hopefully he gets a chance soon to get a few more games under his belt.

In / out: Out

Pre matcher: Stag in Glasgow

Match:  Stag in Glasgow

Post matcher:  Stag in Glasgow

Prediction: 1-0 Dons. Consie

Shankland wont play.

In / out: Out

Pre matcher:Shopping

Match:  Walk along Portobello Prom & coffee

Post matcher:  Mass & Easter Eggs

Prediction: The dons are bound to win since I'm not gonna be there - Rooney & Shankland & maybe Goodwillie 

 

In / out: in

Pre matcher: kings, Scotia

Match:  Y

Post matcher:  Stag or Scotia

Prediction: 2 - 0 one early, one late Logan and Rooney

 

Echo above, would love to see Shankers get a full game, but tbh I dont know who I would take out (why im nae a manager I suppose), possibly our strongest team out today, going to be a struggle to even get on the bench for some.

Happy with that line up. Great to see shankland starting.

Sounds like the jags are playing the better of the two of us.

Well fuck that for a season

Any comment on how we played the day? I find BBC live text hard to gauge much from. As TC said a while back, going to Tenerife was a risk, unfortunately it doesn't look like its paid off.

'A bad day at the office' , try as they might , nothing seemed to go right. Johnny a little bit off the pace but good to have him back. Gappy to see Shankland start but would have preferred to see Pawlett and McGinn start too , Willow should have been on the bench. Logan got MOTM but nobody stood out and it might gave been anyone.

 

Thistle arguably won on points , confirmed by Willie Miller on Sportsound.

 

Hoping for better on Wednesday.

Sportscene saying there were boo's at the end?

We were pretty awful today, no idea what dm was trying to do with the formation at the start.

Missed opportunity to all but tie up second place so gutted about that. Reckon it has to be the first time I have ever known sections of a team's support blame a goalkeeper for the fact that his team drew nothing each.

No prizes for guessing where you can find that

There's a couple of things I'd stress first.

 

The pitch was awful. It's cut up to fuck. Playing a passing game on it is near impossible. It's impacted on our performances at home in the last month or so. Add in the rain and a bobbly pitch has also become a slick one. We didn't alter our plan to the conditions. We kept in one the deck and the conditions made a short passing game very difficult. Thistle pressed us hard too so there were so many errors made that we looking embarrassingly bad compared to the types of performances we've become used to this season.

 

The referee cost us the points though. I'm maybe being harsh but the 50/50 with Hayes through on goal looked fair to me and I'm confident Jonny would have finished had he been given the opportunity. We've been shafted time and again by refs this season. If it balances out over the course of the season, we're due some serious good fortune.

 

I think we've also got to remember how far we've come. It used to be that "a bad day at the office" resulted in a sizeable defeat to rivals on a fraction of our budget. We're now in a position where I canna even remember the last time we lost at home.

 

That said, we were poor yesterday. We didn't capitalise on early pressure. We didn't try to have a pop from distance until the dying embers of the game, despite the slippery conditions clearly causing both keepers problems. We didn't really show a fighting spirit. Although I was glad Shankland got a chance, it caused us to change our shape to accommodate him. I don't think McInnes has been hugely successful when he's done this this season. When he's experimented, we've invariably had to revert to more familiar systems, often before half time. We looked much better when McGinn and Pawlett replaced Flood and Shankand.

 

It was a disappointing performance but conditions and officials, as well as team selection, tactics, both our own and Thistle's, conspired against us. Credit to Partick and the bulk of the responsibility to McInnes.

Directed to Big Al - You seem like you have something to say? Nobody ever blamed a keeper for a clean sheet. The bigger issue is that it is impossible for AFC to compete without a competent keeper. As it is obvious that we've not had competence between the sticks for a whole decade, the real question is why?

 

Leighton is a wage we can ill afford. Anybody adding zero value to the cause shouldn't get paid for it. What is Milne's cause is a definition that requires clarification and the competence of Brown and McInnes with respect to their knowledge of goalkeeping in particular must be zero. We employ experts to run our club. The fact that they fail us is sickening. The fact that some of you can't see it is no surprise. The fact that our successive managers and Directors of Football - executive and non-executive - can't see it is totally unacceptable.

Directed to Big Al - You seem like you have something to say? Nobody ever blamed a keeper for a clean sheet. The bigger issue is that it is impossible for AFC to compete without a competent keeper. As it is obvious that we've not had competence between the sticks for a whole decade, the real question is why?

 

Leighton is a wage we can ill afford. Anybody adding zero value to the cause shouldn't get paid for it. What is Milne's cause is a definition that requires clarification and the competence of Brown and McInnes with respect to their knowledge of goalkeeping in particular must be zero. We employ experts to run our club. The fact that they fail us is sickening. The fact that some of you can't see it is no surprise. The fact that our successive managers and Directors of Football - executive and non-executive - can't see it is totally unacceptable.

 

I saw a few comments on the AFC Facebook page that still managed to blame Clangers. But you're right, the bigger picture is that much like our prolonged issue and lack of left back, the goalkeeper remains to be a massive Achilles heel in our squad.  I don't think that it's not a case of DM not seeing it, he's clearly made the right calls this season as to when to drop someone, but the problem being that they are equally as incompetent. An area that really does need to be addressed this summer, arguably cost us a far greater season than we already have had.

 

I also think that what has been mentioned recently about DM's tactics, is a clear reason as to why he is with us.  He is still young and has things to learn and I am confident he will do that.  What troubles me is that we don't appear to have a plan b (as highlighted by Stooge's post).  Despite the conditions being wholly unfavourable for our successful passing game, we continue to do so probably to the detriment of results.  Obviously I'm not calling for a long ball game here, far from it, but hopefully the team and management use what has been learnt and the progress that has clearly been made to good use next season.

 

We really do need to get second place tied up though. I don't want an exiting end to the season (from that respect).

Directed to Big Al - You seem like you have something to say? Nobody ever blamed a keeper for a clean sheet. The bigger issue is that it is impossible for AFC to compete without a competent keeper. As it is obvious that we've not had competence between the sticks for a whole decade, the real question is why?

 

Leighton is a wage we can ill afford. Anybody adding zero value to the cause shouldn't get paid for it. What is Milne's cause is a definition that requires clarification and the competence of Brown and McInnes with respect to their knowledge of goalkeeping in particular must be zero. We employ experts to run our club. The fact that they fail us is sickening. The fact that some of you can't see it is no surprise. The fact that our successive managers and Directors of Football - executive and non-executive - can't see it is totally unacceptable.

 

Ok Rocket I'll engage.

What you say is not that different to what I have to say.

Few things to clarify firstly, I am no great fan of Langfield, Brown or indeed Leighton as a supposed goalkeeping coach. Goalkeeping errors have cost us dear on a number of occasions already this season (and other seasons come to it ). You are right to say that a goalkeeper shouldn't be blamed for a clean sheet, however to suggest that nobody ever did is totally wrong at this time. Manc has already highlighted the existence of this out there in the world wide web. Trust me there are several comments on a.n.other AFC website where posters clearly blame Langfield for the loss of two points yesterday. I'm sure you'll be able to find them if you look.

The goalkeeping position is of real concern to me, as it patently is to you, however unfortunately we are stuck with two keepers under contract for the next season that few of us rate. Resorting to petty name calling against them, and blaming them for all our ills because it suits an agenda (that is not directed against you ) patently serves no purpose and does us no good. Does Leighton's track record of identifying future No 1's fill me with confidence....does it hell as like.

 

Do I have the answers.... No

Do you....I don't know but I'm sure you'll share if you do 

While I'd agree that it's a measure of how far we've come that we can be openly frustrated by a game like that, we were seriously off the pace. Too many good players didn't turn up, or got frustrated, and we didn't seem to be able to change things. I'd agree that we were unlucky that the ref didn't play advantage in the first half, and with the Hayes challenge, but we were seriously fortunate to even get a point. Taylor had two incredible chances, and seriously unsettled the defence.

 

It's clichéd, but fans will forgive most things other than a perceived lack of effort. While I don't believe that was the case, there were too many players misplacing easy passes, not making runs and relying on smashing it long to Rooney. We've been better than that. It was the most un-McInnes I've seen us.

 

I've long supported Langfield, but we again saw the best and worst of him. He's the best in the league at one-vs-one's, but his distribution was seriously poor and he had two rushes of blood that could have been costly. How this is Leighton's fault, I'll never know, but the goalkeeper issue is pressing.

 

A poor show, in which we were lucky to get away with a point. Caley will comfortably beat us if we play like that midweek. Against the perspective of the whole season, it's small fry, but it'd be a shame if the last months of the season petered out.

My gripe with yesterdays game and that of the Dundee game, is that we have somehow started to let 'long ball' tactics creep into our game. Several times yesterday both Taylor and Reynolds punted the ball up to no one, which in itself is bad enough, but we we dont have a tall enough or physical enough players to deal with the long ball, with the exception of Rooney. I have personally thought for a few weeks now that Reynolds has been poor at the back. He looks unsure at times and resorts to punting tactics more often than a straightforward pass.

 

The criticism of Langfield/Brown for the season is justified to an extent, but he Langfield didnt do much wrong yesterday. His kicking is pish, but thats no secret. What i cant stand is defenders needlessly passing the ball back to him and allowing the margin of error to increase. He should be able to cope with standard back passes, but he doesnt so therefore there is no need to pass it too him.

 

Yesterday was frustrating, we didnt play well and we didnt look like we were going to create anything. The referee's decision against Hayes was bizarre to say the least and once again that may have cost us points. A draw was a fair result, dissipointing as it is. Hopefully we can pick ourselves up and wrap up second place. Once that happens I would like to see Shankland, Cammy et.al get starts in the remainder of the games. Looking forward to next season already.