The Famous Aberdeen - Season 2022/23

[DrewDon]

10 minutes ago, DukDukGoose said:

Would have to disagree tbh.

Robson had 5 defenders in a line, slowly passing square balls to one another before shelling the ball up to 5 attackers stood in a line. Plan b was shelling the ball to a lone striker.

We also give the opponents a lot of time to pick and choose how they play out. Seems like he wants pressure on the opposition defender to play the pass, otherwise they go long which shouldn't be an issue to deal with.

I think we kind of ended up in the situation you describe because we couldn't play in transition, though. When we could play like Robson wanted us to, mostly in Europe and against the Old Firm, we actually looked like a pretty cohesive team. We gradually witnessed the emergence of a blueprint for playing successfully against us, and Robson didn't know how to deal with it. 

My concern is that, regardless of the pressing, a canny manager will be happy to cede possession and sit in a low block, and basically challenge us to break them down, especially at Pittodrie. We have seen it a few times this season and generally not coped well with it. I think one of the big challenges for Thelin will be how he copes when we end up in that position, although you would hope a coach rated as highly as he appears to be would have the ability to adapt to that.

Edited April 30 by DrewDon

[Dons_1988]

10 minutes ago, DrewDon said:

I think we kind of ended up in the situation you describe because we couldn't play in transition, though. When we could play like Robson wanted us to, mostly in Europe and against the Old Firm, we actually looked like a pretty cohesive team. We gradually witnessed the emergence of a blueprint for playing successfully against us, and Robson didn't know how to deal with it. 

My concern is that, regardless of the pressing, a canny manager will be happy to cede possession and sit in a low block, and basically challenge us to break them down, especially at Pittodrie. We have seen it a few times this season and generally not coped well with it. I think one of the big challenges for Thelin will be how he copes when we end up in that position, although you would hope a coach rated as highly as he appears to be would have the ability to adapt to that.

Yeah I agree. My thoughts on reading his style was it sounded a lot like what robson said he wanted to do, and also what we did see in Europe and even games like the pre season friendly with Charlton where it was really effective. 

He struggled badly when it got found out here though as you say. The silver lining is that there was an elfsborg fan on the ABZ podcast who said that in the early years thelin played much more possession based stuff but adapted when it didn’t work to a higher press style. 

The inability to adapt was probably Robsons biggest flaw so hopefully we’ve got someone with a bit more of that. 

[Sortmeout]

On 28/04/2024 at 08:23, kingjoey said:

Does Derek McInnes signing of Van Veen rival our signing of Neil Warnock as the most pointless signing of the season? Probably not quite, but not too far off.

All that competition for places has definitely hurt our push for the top 4.

[kingjoey]

43 minutes ago, Sortmeout said:

All that competition for places has definitely hurt our push for the top 4.

He's been a shite signing, and money down the drain. Being an Aberdeen fan this season, I know all about shite signings and money down the drain.

[coprolite]

I'd thought that most of our problems had been defensive this season, but hadn't realised how bad we've been at scoring. We could do with improving both obviously, but we're currently sixth equal for fewest goals conceded and fourth bottom for scoring. 

I guess aimless punts don't lead to many chances. 

[RandomGuy.]

2 hours ago, Dons_1988 said:

Was that the Bayern team that thumped Barca? They were class. I remember watching bundesliga highlights and thinking they were outstanding. Got laughed at when I said I’d thought they’d beat Barca relatively comfortably. 

Aye.

That result shouldve brought about a trend of football clubs playing "chaos football", which would've been brilliant.

Instead Guardiola went to Bayern with his boring safe shite, then City, and suffocated it from ever happening.

Ive completely lost interest in "top level" football and I blame him for it.

[tarapoa]

2 hours ago, DrewDon said:

My concern is that, regardless of the pressing, a canny manager will be happy to cede possession and sit in a low block, and basically challenge us to break them down, especially at Pittodrie. We have seen it a few times this season and generally not coped well with it. I think one of the big challenges for Thelin will be how he copes when we end up in that position, although you would hope a coach rated as highly as he appears to be would have the ability to adapt to that.

This exactly.

There's a reason this season's better results have generally been against better (or certainly more ambitious) opposition.   Barry seemed to base everything on his transition football Plan A.

Surely the FMB take into account that at least 70% of our fixtures, certainly at home, are against sides who will sit in and where guile and sometimes power are necessary to break the opposition down and open up the game for counter-attacking to even be an option.

Calderwood and McInnes tended to be good enough at getting the kind of narrow wins that Leven just achieved against Ross Co and Well in these situations - but it was just often very unspectacular and that eventually wears the fans down.

We are not an easy side to manage at times !

 

[afc_blockhead]

3 hours ago, Sortmeout said:

All that competition for places has definitely hurt our push for the top 4.

No need to get defensive.

What part of Van Veen's zero goals in 10 games have put other strikers under pressure?

[Red Kite]

Listening to the ABZ podcast.  I was totally wrong about Warnock being up for a scrap.  However, I I like the sound of this Jimmy lad.  I enjoy an element of possession-based football, but it has to be with skillful players and not just for the sake of it.  High-pressing football can give everyone a lift.  I am sure some scribes up there already have their copy ready with phrases like Thelin is "burning the players out" and such nonsense.  With the right conditioning, I can't see maintaining intensity throughout the season being an issue.

[Sortmeout]

1 hour ago, afc_blockhead said:

No need to get defensive.

What part of Van Veen's zero goals in 10 games have put other strikers under pressure?

Just his very presence is enough to inspire the Ayrshire lads to greatness.

If you remember correctly he failed to come off the bench in one particular game and look what happened - we lost. 
 

The man is a maverick and his 10 minute cameos and less than 100 touches have been a joy to watch.

[afc_blockhead]

46 minutes ago, Sortmeout said:

Just his very presence is enough to inspire the Ayrshire lads to greatness.

If you remember correctly he failed to come off the bench in one particular game and look what happened - we lost. 
 

The man is a maverick and his 10 minute cameos and less than 100 touches have been a joy to watch.

I stand corrected. Definitely NOT a waste of money.

[Sortmeout]

1 hour ago, afc_blockhead said:

I stand corrected. Definitely NOT a waste of money.

You’ve forgotten the Rangers rule in your theory.

[MikeAFC94]

High pressing doesn't work when you can't play a high defensive line, mind. And our centre halves are all slower than a week in jail.

 

 

[Steve_Wilkos]

An embarrassing appeal and it's an embarrassment that Vale hasn't been given an extra game due to its frivolous nature.

The SPFL's anti-Cormack bias continues unabated.

[kingjoey]

1 hour ago, Steve_Wilkos said:

An embarrassing appeal and it's an embarrassment that Vale hasn't been given an extra game due to its frivolous nature.

The SPFL's anti-Cormack bias continues unabated.

It's incredible that this wasn't considered frivilous. 

[kingjoey]

13 hours ago, kingjoey said:

Nice to see Motherwell giving free money to the SFA in appealing Saturday’s red card.

 

[kingjoey]

You thought Motherwell had a chance of overturning that red @Cowboy Dan ?

[coprolite]

8 hours ago, kingjoey said:

It's incredible that this wasn't considered frivilous. 

I disagree. I think there was a reasonable but weak argument that it was harsh and Motherwell were within their rights to appeal, even though it had a very low chance of success. 

What was incredible was our appeal last season (was it only last season?) being considered frivolous. 

If consistency was a thing, then using Shinnie's appeal as the benchmark of frivolity, most appeals would result in longer bans. But it's not consistent at all. 

[kingjoey]

1 hour ago, coprolite said:

I disagree. I think there was a reasonable but weak argument that it was harsh and Motherwell were within their rights to appeal, even though it had a very low chance of success. 

What was incredible was our appeal last season (was it only last season?) being considered frivolous. 

If consistency was a thing, then using Shinnie's appeal as the benchmark of frivolity, most appeals would result in longer bans. But it's not consistent at all. 

It really was as obvious a red card using today's Laws Of The Game as you're likely to see. Totally pointless appeal.

[Dons_1988]

36 minutes ago, kingjoey said:

It really was as obvious a red card using today's Laws Of The Game as you're likely to see. Totally pointless appeal.

I agree with @coprolite tbh. I’d go a step further and say the frivolous appeal rule is totally needless. 

The risk of manipulating what fixtures you’re suspended for is pretty much gone so the deterrent is irrelevant. Clubs should have a right of appeal and the criteria for what counts as ‘frivolous’ is so flimsy that the lack of consistency would always be there. 

We all knew after the shinnie one that we’d see plenty of appeals get rejected and not done for frivolous like we did, but the answer for me is to remove it, not charge more clubs with it.