ABERDEEN v Motherwell match thread

[Shetland Don]

I thought we were dreadful all over the park yesterday. Big improvement needed. A team that couldn't score in 180 minutes against a league of Ireland side cut through us like a knife through butter yesterday. Defence is still very worrying. Could have been a lot worse. Miovski looks a striker though. Why take Hayes off yesterday? Ramadani looks slow. Richardson never a right back. Too many simply turned up yesterday thinking they'd just roll over murderwell. C'mon Jim sort it out for next few games.

I agree with most of that. We look quick down the left flank but there’s a lack of quality in the final ball. Miovski looks good and a handful too for defenders. The defence looked very shaky yesterday and we were breached far too easily, far too often. Far too many sideways passes too. Unless we win most of our next few games, sadly the early optimism will be replaced with apathy for many fans.

[GASC1980]

You're spot on Shetland Don. I said after the tims game we'd need to win the next 6. St. Mirren, Motherwell, St. Johnstone, Livingston, Annan and Ross County. No matter what, other than the two cheeks of the same arse, we'd be in a great position going into the huns game. Sadly that's one of these six gone. These are the games we need to win. If we don't as you say apathy will set in and it could be a lonh difficult season. I'm still remaining positive for the time being.

[donsdaft]

As we look back at the end of the season at going undefeated since that terrible game against Motherwell.
Perhaps we'll be glad that we got a chance to learn our lesson so convincingly.

Back to the real ( but still optimistic) world.

There's a fair few players yesterday got a lesson in Scottish fitba.
If you don't win the battle first then you don't get the chance to play exciting attacking football.

[57vintage]

I'm a bit confused by the constant d1cking about with the middle of the defence.
I'm not sure if the issue is Scales being missing, out on the left, McCrorie not being good enough at centre back or missing McCrorie protecting the back four when he's taken out of centre mid, possibly a combination of all of them.
To my mind, you get the centre back combo right and build out from there.

I think that Motherwell knew that distributing from the back isn’t Stewart’s forte. We didn’t sign him for that. He’s a dominant stopper who wins most balls in the air, and reads the game quite well on the ground. As they did with Ash Taylor when he had competent ball-players alongside him (Logan, Reynolds, Shinnie), opposition forwards close down the skilled players until the last resort pass is to the centre half who then has to play a long ball, or try to make forward runs as Stewart worryingly did yesterday. I remember St Perth doing it incessantly against us when we lost 5-1 to them at home in 15-16. ****s.

Stewart is a definite improvement on Gallagher and Bates, but he’s not Beckenbauer, or even Brian Irvine. That’s the market we’re in.

[Red Zone]

I think that Motherwell knew that distributing from the back isn’t Stewart’s forte. We didn’t sign him for that. He’s a dominant stopper who wins most balls in the air, and reads the game quite well on the ground. As they did with Ash Taylor when he had competent ball-players alongside him (Logan, Reynolds, Shinnie), opposition forwards close down the skilled players until the last resort pass is to the centre half who then has to play a long ball, or try to make forward runs as Stewart worryingly did yesterday. I remember St Perth doing it incessantly against us when we lost 5-1 to them at home in 15-16. ****s.

Stewart is a definite improvement on Gallagher and Bates, but he’s not Beckenbauer, or even Brian Irvine. That’s the market we’re in.

Completely agree on Stewart, that's why we must always play Scales alongside him as he is very comfortable on the ball. Next week I would then have McCrorie alongside Ramadani sitting in front of the defense and then push Clarkson forward into the No 10 role where he can hopefully do more damage. So something like

Roos
Richardson Stewart Scales Coulson
McCrorie Ramadani
Clarkson
Besuijen Miovski Hayes

[RED_JOHN]

Stewart is a dreadful defender. His reading of the game was pathetic yesterday for an experienced central defender. Have a look at the goals we conceded….he himself could have done a lot better in them all. Aberdeen shouldn’t be signing professional football players who can’t pass a ball. Passing a ball in top league professional football should be a given….it’s ridiculous that we sign defender’s who cannot pass a ball properly into the midfield. What a mockery of our recruitment policy.

[Jussi]

Stewart is a dreadful defender. His reading of the game was pathetic yesterday for an experienced central defender. Have a look at the goals we conceded….he himself could have done a lot better in them all. Aberdeen shouldn’t be signing professional football players who can’t pass a ball. Passing a ball in top league professional football should be a given….it’s ridiculous that we sign defender’s who cannot pass a ball properly into the midfield. What a mockery of our recruitment policy.

Quite a few fans think he's a good defender & just needs an associate to do the passing for him !
Absurd beyond belief IMO. He ,after all, has to attempt a pass to the partner in the first instance.
How weakening will that be to the team, on multiple levels. Opposition will easily suss this out & hone in, while the dubious act unfolds.
He's just going to end up punting up the park , which I suspect will be the manager's orders from now on.

I can not believe Goodwin would have signed him if he'd known how chronic his distribution is.

But what do I know!

[Teddy Bear]

Spot on. Either Goodwin isn't asking us to do that or the players aren't following his instructions. Either way it's down to him.

Goodwin to Aberdeen reminded me of big terry butcher going to hibs. It was never going to work. He has to go and soon, Aberdeen should be able to beat a really poor Motherwell side that we’re thumped by the Irish rovers. Depressing stuff for new firm fans and scottish football in general. Aberdeen should be a top 6 side

[Red Zone]

m sorry but you guys are wrong. By the length of Union Street the priority for signing defenders should be an ability to defend and stop goals. We have spent the last three seasons or so pretending that we are some sort of Barcelona type team that can pass out from the back and start moves that end up with the ball in the back of the net. Have we not learned anything? All that happens is that we end up knocking about 20 square passes in our own half before ultimately someone hoofs it up the park anyway. We don't spend the sort of money on players to be able to successfully play that style of football (which goes for the vast majority of Scottish teams).

I'll say it again - defenders should be signed on their ability to defend - look at last season where we signed a bag of spanners worth of defenders and had an absolutely sh1t season primarily due to having something like 4 clean sheets out of 38 games. Three game in and no clean sheets but a big part of that for me is that our best central defenders have played together for only 12 of the 270 minutes in the centre of defense. They must get a run of games together (McCrorie is not good enough to play central defense - see aforementioned record of last season) even if that means playing makeshift full backs. Stewart is a good penalty box defender and good in the air for his height, just don't ask him to do stuff that he is not capable of doing like being the second coming of Beckenbauer. The defender I actually am much more concerned about is Richardson, who seems to have virtually no positional sense and stands off his man even more than Logan did. He looks good going forward (he did very well for our second goal yesterday) but I'll say again, the absolute priority for a right back is an ability to defend.

I realise my views will be seen as old fashioned by some and not the "modern" way to play the game but I'll say again, fine if you are signing multi-million pound defenders that have the ability to pick a pass but we are fishing in the pool several levels below that and are simply not able to sign players with the level of ability to "play through the lines". So let's stop d1cking about with the ball in our own half and get the ball up the park much faster and leave the defenders to concentrate on keeping far more clean sheets

[RED_JOHN]

Quite a few fans think he's a good defender & just needs an associate to do the passing for him !
Absurd beyond belief IMO. He ,after all, has to attempt a pass to the partner in the first instance.
How weakening will that be to the team, on multiple levels. Opposition will easily suss this out & hone in, while the dubious act unfolds.
He's just going to end up punting up the park , which I suspect will be the manager's orders from now on.

I can not believe Goodwin would have signed him if he'd known how chronic his distribution is.

But what do I know!

As you say he will definitely be targeted from now on. If I was the opposing manager I would encourage my team to let him get the ball to his feet as he is a disaster waiting to happen. I also don’t get the admiration for his ability to defend and positional play….it’s bad at best. He can header a ball….but surely you wouldn’t just employ a central defender because he can header a ball as that should be a must.
Maybe I ask too much of players nowadays or the standards have dropped that much we as a club accept any dross.