Still unbeaten in 2012…..Just

A few months ago if someone had said on February 11th Aberdeen will still be unbeaten in 2012, I would have thought they should be in a padded cell along with mad Vlad.
But fellow Dons fans this is indeed the case.
Some of the performances have not been pretty, but Craig Brown has done what he was brought in to do, make us a hard team to beat.

Hibs have made major changes in the transfer window, and have been showing some improvement under Pat Felon in recent weeks, I said before the game I would settle for a point.
The game itself by the sounds of it was a big improvement from the previous 2 games between the teams, Aberdeen had some chances in the 1st half and started the 2nd half off well, then let Hibs into the game and never really created much after that.

Hibs will also be kicking themselves for a number of missed chances, especially with Dunfermine losing heavily to Rangers in the early kick off.

As I said earlier I would have taken a point before the game and as Hibs piled on the pressure as the game drew to an end, it was a relief to hear the final whistle.

It is back to Scottish Cup business for the Dons on Tuesday, lets hope there is no romance of the cup stories for Queen of the south on what will not be an enjoyable Valentines day for the Aberdeen travelling support.
What a difference 4 years makes, 14th Feb 2008 Aberdeen were hosting Bayern Munich at Pittodrie in the UEFA cup and got a credible 2-2 draw, 4 years on we are away to Queen of the South in a cup replay.

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Time for a change

Where do I start. I am almost speechless after tonight result. Not only were we lucky to get the game to extra time with a last minute penalty , but we could not finish off a part time team who were so exhausted that half their team were going down with cramp, in 30 minutes of extra time. A penalty shoot out is a lottery, but to miss 3 penalties against a second division team is criminal. One thing I do not understand is that Josh Magennes was clearly injured and Craig Brown let him take a penalty.

Craig Brown has said it shows that our Fringe players are not good enough, Again I say it was East Fife we were playing, If they cannot compete with the team at the bottom of Division 2 then what hope is there.

In my opinion there needs to be major changes at the club, from top to bottom.
Stewart Milne seems more interested in moving to the  new stadium than he is in whats happening on the pitch. Willie Miller is the Director of Football but he is directing us in the wrong direction. It was his decision to  give Calderwood a big contract extension then fire him a year later, it was his decision to bring Mark Mcghee who dragged us back into the lower regions of the SPL. Too many wrong decisions. Stewart Milne is not exempt from making wrong decisions either. Aberdeen have gone from being one of the few teams in the world never to have fired a manager to firing managers every couple of years.
These managers have all been hired and fired by Stewart Milne.

I know there is no big money man waiting to buy Stewart Milne out. We are not looking for a team full of million pound players, but we should be able to compete with Hearts and Dundee United for players (teams who have allegedly  signed players Aberdeen were also after but could not match wages). We should be able to field a team that can beat East Fife in the league cup, Who can regularly qualify for Europe and get us to cup finals which we might win now and again.

We are supposed to be Scotland 3rd biggest team, going by trophies won, structure of the club and fan base of the team and our wage budget. But no trophies in 16 years is not good enough. Dick Donald and Chris Anderson must be turning in their graves.

 

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Aberdeen Hearts are broken

Aberdeen came into a tough game at Tynecastle today on the back of a very encouraging display against Celtic last weekend, with Hearts struggling to find wins in the SPL having not won since March this year, I was quietly confident that we could take at least a point away from Tynecastle.

My confidence was growing in the early stages of the game as Aberdeen were all over Hearts and looked the most likely to score, but as usual the Dons strikers could not hit the target and were getting caught offside a worrying amount of times.

With virtually their first attack of the game Hearts went up the park and scored and Aberdeen just fell apart. As Red Tv said the worrying thing is that Aberdeen are getting players back from injury and apart from Folly we had a full strength squad out there today.

This was a disgraceful display from Aberdeen especially since they had just under 2000 fans who made the trip to Edinburgh and with reports of SPL attendances dropping, if Aberdeen continue the way they are then those  die-hard fans could slowly disappear.

It is clear there is a major problem at Pittodrie, We have changed managers in the last year, made major changes to the team in the summer and things are still looking as bleak.
So what is the problem??? Are the players we are bringing in no better than what we had? Are the player  these days just happy to collect a wage and don’t care what happens on the park?  Do we not have the funds to compete for players better than our opponents? Do the players just not fit in to the managers formation and tactics?
Are the managers tactics just not working? Or is it all of the above.

This is going to be a long frustrating season as a Dons fan I just hope that the players can get their fingers out and turn things around.

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New Season, New Attitude, Same missed chances.

Aberdeen came into the new season with most of the fans feeling some optimism that we would see an improved side with the players Craig and Archie have brought in over the summer.
One new signing that was not fit for the game was Chris Clark.

We played well and were creating chances but I was always nervous that we would end up regretting our missed chances as has happened so often in the past.
We could have been 3 or 4 up at half time and if corners meant goals we would have been way ahead. St Johnstone changed it up a bit in the 2nd half and came at us a bit more, but in truth the Aberdeen defence looked comfortable.

The major turning point in the match was the red card to Ryan Jack for a late challenge on Murray Davidson, some people saying it was a bad challenge others saying it was a free kick and a yellow card at most. I will look forward to seeing it on the highlights.
(Having seen the highlights and listened to the players and managers thoughts it looks like it was a red card, the studs were a little high but I think it was just  a young player trying hard to win the ball)

Craig Brown has spoken about wanting to bring in a flair player and after seeing some of the missed chances I can see what he means. Hopefully said striker will be in place before our trip to St Mirren next weekend.

So not the flying start we had last season (but look how that turned out) but we need to remember that it is a marathon and not a race.

So in all I am disappointed with the 0-0 draw and the missed chances but pleased with the build up play and attitude of the team.

I would also like to mention Ricky Foster who got a hard time in one of the pre season games for going on loan to Rangers last season, he played well and had a few chances, he looked like (as someone on twitter said) a man on a mission.
Ricky was also voted man of the match Keep up the good work Captain Foster.
I was also impressed with Josh Magennis, our new signing’s impressed also. I don’t think we had a bad player in the team today.

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Welcome Back Chris Clark

Rumours were flying around the Aberdeen message boards this evening of a triple signing being announced tomorrow one of which was rumoured to be former player Chris Clark who left Pittodrie during the winter transfer window of 2008 for Plymouth Argyle.

Plymouth were relegated last season and released a number of players. Chris Clark being one of them

I think this is a good signing. Chris was never one of the flair players but he did his job and did it well. The fact he can play in a number of positions like the returning Ricky Foster is also good as a team like Aberdeen need versatile players who can slot in and help out when we have injuries and suspensions.

There seems to be a mixed reaction to our latest addition to the team on the Aberdeen message boards but how boring would this world be if everyone agreed on everything.

Lets just hope the doubters give him a chance.

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