The Famous Aberdeen - Season 2022/23

[d31]

6 hours ago, Irrational Behaviour said:

Probably unpopular opinion but I think the top 5 positions aren't going to change. The gaps between all teams involved are too significant to overhaul given the amount of points available. 

As a result, if I were in charge, I'd rather see Ross, Virtanen, Ngwenya, Ruth, MacKenzie etc.  get extended playing time. How do we know they'll be good enough when there's going to be a big reliance on youth next season? 

Delighted to see Campbell nailing down his place in the team, he's been brilliant in the past few games he's started. McLennan too has also got to be starting. I understand the argument that he lacks a footballing brain but he carried the ball 20+ yards numerous times yesterday. When was the last time anyone did that for us? 

I'd rather these boys got a game as opposed to McGinn who was painful to watch yesterday. 2nd oldest starting XI in the league, some of which we can't rely on to start every game due to fitness and their history of injuries. 

 

I'm not convinced on our certainty to finish 4th quite yet but 6 points either side at the split would confirm that and leave the last five games to use some younger players and younger managers etc

 

[DrewDon]

6 hours ago, Irrational Behaviour said:

I'd rather these boys got a game as opposed to McGinn who was painful to watch yesterday. 2nd oldest starting XI in the league, some of which we can't rely on to start every game due to fitness and their history of injuries. 

McGinn didn't look particularly comfortable in open play yesterday, but it was only his piece of quality between us winning that and another utterly turgid 0-0. There's a case to say that he has to be starting at the moment because he is the only fit player we have in the squad who can produce moments like that on even a semi-regular basis. 

[DukDukGoose]

27 minutes ago, DrewDon said:

McGinn didn't look particularly comfortable in open play yesterday, but it was only his piece of quality between us winning that and another utterly turgid 0-0. There's a case to say that he has to be starting at the moment because he is the only fit player we have in the squad who can produce moments like that on even a semi-regular basis. 

Yesterday felt like it was the first time McGinn has beaten the first man with a set piece all season.

[A96]

1 hour ago, d31 said:

I'm not convinced on our certainty to finish 4th quite yet but 6 points either side at the split would confirm that and leave the last five games to use some younger players and younger managers etc

 

Hibs’ll drop enough points before the end of the season for us to catch them but the odds are against us being able to do that.  Far too early yet for us to give up on third though. No way that McInnes will experiment with young players any more than he has done previously until the final league placings have been decided.

I’m clinging to the hope that Hibs’ luck , and in particular , their benefit from refereeing decisions , has to change sometime.  

Obviously , though it’s too much of a stretch to think that we’re going to get anything more than the very occasional lucky break from the refs.

Edited February 21, 2021 by A96

[big al]

Killie have lost their last 8 and are probably the current worst team in the league. There was very little between the teams. 3rd is pie in the sky now.

[tarapoa]

3 hours ago, A96 said:

Hibs’ll drop enough points before the end of the season for us to catch them but the odds are against us being able to do that.  Far too early yet for us to give up on third though. No way that McInnes will experiment with young players any more than he has done previously until the final league placings have been decided.

I’m clinging to the hope that Hibs’ luck , and in particular , their benefit from refereeing decisions , has to change sometime.  

Obviously , though it’s too much of a stretch to think that we’re going to get anything more than the very occasional lucky break from the refs.

Every time I switch on livescore they seem to be playing against ten men - and they're getting penalties handed to them like confetti, including against us. They also appear to have had nowhere near the injury issues we have, albeit take the earlier point that some of our signings (e.g. Leigh, McGeouch, Devlin) were injuries waiting to happen - but some have just been unlucky.  (However the real debate on injuries from the Scottish media is how long "Tav" will be out for).

Main thing though is Hibs early January signings of Irvine and Cadden look quite astute...........and they were able to resist bids for key players, whereas we couldn't get them out the door quickly enough. Are they somehow more financial well-equipped to deal with a pandemic than us?

Unless they really Hibs things from here, they will get the lottery win of 3rd place - though we could put a multitude of sins right by choosing this season to win the Scottish Cup.

[Bogbrush1903]

12 minutes ago, tarapoa said:

 though we could put a multitude of sins right by choosing this season to win the Scottish Cup.

I don't think there is any chance of the Scottish Cup finishing (perhaps even restarting) before European competition begins. Many of the teams left in the competition haven't kicked a ball for the last month and won't be ready to play anytime soon even if the political will was there to allow them to do so...which it isn't....this strategy (madness) of zero covid will ensure the 2021 Scottish Cup Final will be in the second half of the year again...

Edited February 21, 2021 by Bogbrush1903

[tarapoa]

15 hours ago, Bogbrush1903 said:

I don't think there is any chance of the Scottish Cup finishing (perhaps even restarting) before European competition begins. Many of the teams left in the competition haven't kicked a ball for the last month and won't be ready to play anytime soon even if the political will was there to allow them to do so...which it isn't....this strategy (madness) of zero covid will ensure the 2021 Scottish Cup Final will be in the second half of the year again...

If we were looking like finishing 3rd, that would be fine.

As that is not the case - then hopefully it can be done still, and given the prize, probably should be.

This weekend's fixtures were in lieu of a Scottish Cup weekend. It may now be that there has to be the harsh decision to determine a date (maybe for a condensed tournament over a couple of weekends/midweeks) - and if clubs cannot fulfil the fixture, it's a forfeit.   

The SFA were content for Covid picked up on their watch to be the reason for key Aberdeen and Motherwell players missing important fixtures earlier in the season - therefore, they'll probably be fine with making this call.

Edited February 22, 2021 by tarapoa

[Guest Bob Mahelp]

18 hours ago, A96 said:

Hibs’ll drop enough points before the end of the season for us to catch them but the odds are against us being able to do that.  Far too early yet for us to give up on third though. No way that McInnes will experiment with young players any more than he has done previously until the final league placings have been decided.

I’m clinging to the hope that Hibs’ luck , and in particular , their benefit from refereeing decisions , has to change sometime.  

Obviously , though it’s too much of a stretch to think that we’re going to get anything more than the very occasional lucky break from the refs.

Unless Hibs hit a run of catastrophic injuries and/or awful form, there's no way we'll catch them in 3rd. On Saturday we beat the only team in the league that is in (marginally) worse form than us. 

[AngusTheBull]

22 hours ago, CCB19035 said:

This is a nonsense argument. There's people who also say "we'd have finished third if the season hadn't finished early" last season, there were people who said the season before "we'd have been third if Kilmarnock didn't have a freak season" and so on and so forth. 
 

Most the games in which we've dropped points this season, we've still had XI's on the pitch good enough to do better.

 

Its also no surprise we have trouble with injuries, our manager loves to sign injury prone players. I get his reasoning, that if you sign a quality player who's a n injury risk, and they stay injury free- you've got a quality player. However, large parts of our squad are made up of guys with terrible injury histories.

Greg Leigh failed a medical at Rotherham before we signed him. It's hardly unlucky or surprising he has subsequently spent most of his time on the sideline or on the physio table. 
 

The only two freakish and unexpected injuries we've had are probably Watkins and Hedges, important players for us no doubt, but there's no way we are just "unlucky." There's a track record of it across the last few seasons. 

Fully agree, even missing two or three players we should have more than enough to take care of teams down the bottom of the league.

We all laughed at Hearts for complaining that they were struggling due to missing first-team players every week while signing permacrocks like Naismith and Souttar so I feel we can't really complain about guys like McGeouch being out for half the season. 

Must admit, I was very wary about signing Hoban but am very pleased he's lasted until now without anything serious.

[Sheep62]

3 minutes ago, AngusTheBull said:

 

Must admit, I was very wary about signing Hoban but am very pleased he's lasted until now without anything serious.

Ah f**k Angus, you just know don't you 

[Dons_1988]

Squad building has been poor ever since 2017. There have been some individual successes but ultimately it’s lacked real strategy and purpose. From 2014 to 2017 you could see in every window how the team was evolving from the core of a good side to the near finished article in the 2017 cup final. 

[AngusTheBull]

2 minutes ago, Sheep62 said:

Ah f**k Angus, you just know don't you 

I've did hesitate before posting that... sorry lads

[DukDukGoose]

1 hour ago, Dons_1988 said:

Squad building has been poor ever since 2017. There have been some individual successes but ultimately it’s lacked real strategy and purpose. From 2014 to 2017 you could see in every window how the team was evolving from the core of a good side to the near finished article in the 2017 cup final. 

Aye.

This is the main reason why I've been wanting change. Ignore poor results or poor football.

We touched on it at the weekend but we ended up signing 3 centre mids that do the same role. Ferguson can also do the job and it's how he is expected to play when McCrorie is in there with him. That then left us with three similar subs and two will be on a good wage.

[Dons_1988]

1 hour ago, Merkland Red said:

Aye.

This is the main reason why I've been wanting change. Ignore poor results or poor football.

We touched on it at the weekend but we ended up signing 3 centre mids that do the same role. Ferguson can also do the job and it's how he is expected to play when McCrorie is in there with him. That then left us with three similar subs and two will be on a good wage.

Aye recruitment has been poor.

We've been playing catch up since 2017. After Mcinnes flirted with Sunderland we had about a fortnight to put a team together for EL qualifiers. He didn't actually do that badly there, our points total in 17/18 was fairly remarkable given we had the arse ripped out of the team the summer before.

But it was definitely about getting whoever was available and good instead of a clear plan. Too many loans/short term fixes, having to rebuild every Summer has killed us really.

[lubo_blaha]

Squad building has been poor ever since 2017. There have been some individual successes but ultimately it’s lacked real strategy and purpose. From 2014 to 2017 you could see in every window how the team was evolving from the core of a good side to the near finished article in the 2017 cup final. 

Agreed. Nearly all of our big signings pre 2017 turned out well (Flood, Robson, Rooney, Logan, McLean, Shinnie, Lewis) and coupled with the fact that we didn’t lose any major players in this players apart from retirements, we improved year on year.

Since then, we’ve signed the likes of May, Arnason, Tansey, Devlin, Forrester, Gleeson, Bryson, Ojo etc. who would have been brought in to be regular starters and none of them have been good enough, not to mention plenty of others in the current squad who I’m giving the benefit of the doubt to.

On the flip side Cosgrove and Ferguson turned out to be great signings but I doubt either were brought in to be regular starters, certainly not immediately.

I think we’d benefit from a director of football type role going forward for recruitment and to have more of a ‘football specialist’ between the board and manager.

[DukDukGoose]

1 hour ago, Dons_1988 said:

Aye recruitment has been poor.

We've been playing catch up since 2017. After Mcinnes flirted with Sunderland we had about a fortnight to put a team together for EL qualifiers. He didn't actually do that badly there, our points total in 17/18 was fairly remarkable given we had the arse ripped out of the team the summer before.

But it was definitely about getting whoever was available and good instead of a clear plan. Too many loans/short term fixes, having to rebuild every Summer has killed us really.

Yeah absolutely.

33 minutes ago, lubo_blaha said:

Agreed. Nearly all of our big signings pre 2017 turned out well (Flood, Robson, Rooney, Logan, McLean, Shinnie, Lewis) and coupled with the fact that we didn’t lose any major players in this players apart from retirements, we improved year on year.

Since then, we’ve signed the likes of May, Arnason, Tansey, Devlin, Forrester, Gleeson, Bryson, Ojo etc. who would have been brought in to be regular starters and none of them have been good enough, not to mention plenty of others in the current squad who I’m giving the benefit of the doubt to.

On the flip side Cosgrove and Ferguson turned out to be great signings but I doubt either were brought in to be regular starters, certainly not immediately.

I think we’d benefit from a director of football type role going forward for recruitment and to have more of a ‘football specialist’ between the board and manager.

Yeah this is spot on. I've been saying the same about the DoF. Ok it is an added expense but if you have a man who shares the boards vision then you are in a better place if your manager is poached or it doesn't work out.

The first group of players mostly fit a system, when we could counter attack. Flood was the ball winner and Robson was an experienced head. We then needed a RB to get up the park as Shaughnessy didn't cut it and neither did our forwards which led to the Rooney signing. McLean and Shinnie were no brainers and again fit the style of play (althoguh McLean took a bit longer to bed in).

The second group are players who on paper should have worked but didn't. Some due to previous injuries catching up with them which is frustrating.

I'd be amazed if Ferguson was bought to start but he certainly took his chance when given to him.

Another major issue is the players bought back for a second time. I can't think of any other team in Scotland who have taken as many players back for a second stint. Motherwell, maybe?

[Guest Bob Mahelp]

2 hours ago, Merkland Red said:

 

Another major issue is the players bought back for a second time. I can't think of any other team in Scotland who have taken as many players back for a second stint. Motherwell, maybe?

Hibs fans are always desperate to get some fat jakey coked up fuckwit back in their team because he once kissed the badge or sang a song about refugees. 

It's only a matter of time until Griffiths gets his dream move back to his comfort blanket. 

 

[Game of throw-ins]

6 hours ago, CCB19035 said:

Someone made a good point, an Aberdeen blogger I think, or a journalist? I canna mind. Anyway, this person said that McInnes seems to get in good players who become available, rather than a player who fits a specific style or system. 
 

Good examples of that being Ojo, James Wilson and Greg Stewart. All good players, but bought to play roles that weren't their strong points. Stewart was asked to play and do a shift on the right, Wilson the same, and Ojo was brought in as a defensive midfielder supposed to keep things simple and win us the ball back, yet we played with the ball going over is head 99% of the time. 
 

Even this season, it's plain for every sane person to see that Kennedy and Hedges definitely aren't wing backs, we're even pushing our luck with Hayes playing there, but because he has this fixed notion on how he wants the team to play, he shoehorns in guys to positions they aren't comfortable with. 
 

How many times have we liked up and everyone's went "what the f**k is this" with regards to formation and tactics. It's bizarre. 

I think we tend to underestimate how random our signing policy is, not because of McInnes's preferences but because it's the nature of the beast.  Managers' awareness of what is available is highly driven by what the people generating the stats tell them.  The pool of players that, on the face of it at least, might strengthen our squad AND might be prepared to come to Scotland AND are available to a club with our budget, is much smaller than we think.  And everybody knows who they are, because every club is seeing the same stats.  The days when a shrewd talent scout or manager could trawl around a few reserve games and spot talent everybody else has missed are long gone.

That's why Scottish clubs with a similar budget to ours (basically Hibs and Hearts) and ourselves are so often competing to sign the same players.  And because signing new players are always a gamble, there will be a randomness to which ones succeed and which ones don't.  Fans like a nice narrative, if player A signs for Hibs and does well and player B signs for Aberdeen and doesn't, it's because the Hibs manager has a better eye for a player.  The truth is much more likely to be that both managers had nearly identical opinions on the two players and chance rather than judgement determined which one turned up at which club.

[Jacksgranda]

On 17/02/2021 at 20:48, BucksburnDandy said:

Tonight was a microcosm of the McInnes era v Celtic. Sit off until we go behind then start going at them but too late as we are already chasing our tail.

Ultimately despite a pretty reasonable performance, we have now won 1 game in the last 10 and are on the worst barren run in the 118 year history of the club - a worse barren run than any of the shite served up by Shaw, Pearson, Bonthrone, Alex Miller, Hegarty, Skovdahl, Paterson, McGhee and Brown.

The statistics are hard to defend despite a reasonable 60 minute performance.

Is it really?

On 19/02/2021 at 12:22, kingjoey said:

One year ago today I witnessed one of the most incredible matches, if not the most incredible, in my 74 years at Rugby Park in the Scottish Cup. Memories.

You're not that age, surely?

On 19/02/2021 at 21:38, G-MAN said:

 

Some cracking old ones in here.

When you think of the ones that aren’t on here (Hearts Tynecastle, Double at Easter Road, Home to Kilmarnock) McGinn was top class.

 

 

 

 

Excellent.

I prefer the Dons playing in white shorts, tbqhwy.

On 20/02/2021 at 08:44, kingjoey said:

I know that’s its probably just me, but that means absolutely nothing to me. You’d be as well showing a picture of a plate of chips.

I could understand that a lot better.