Partick Thistle have become the team which brings out the best in Aberdeen.
The Dons have faced the Jags twice this season and they have scored seven goals without reply.
The Maryhill men competed gamely in their first visit to Pittodrie last night but when it comes to the art of converting chances into goals, the Dons showed them how it is done.
Aberdeen were not at their best but they didn’t have to be and it is a measure of the progress being made under manager Derek McInnes that a home win by four goals can be described as routine.
McInnes made three changes to the team which beat Motherwell in the League Cup with Andrew Considine, Cammy Smith and Michael Hector replacing the injured Clark Robertson, the suspended Joe Shaughnessy and captain Russell Anderson, who dropped to the bench.
The Dons were in a rich vein of form going into this game having won their last three matches without conceding a goal, helping goalkeeper Jamie Langfield take his shutout tally for the season to eight in 14 matches.
But it was opposite number Scott Fox in the Partick goal who was the one celebrating a Scotland call-up by manager Gordon Strachan.
Alan Archibald made one change to his Partick side beaten 2-1 by Celtic, with Gabriel Piccolo replacing fellow defender Conrad Balatoni. Former Don Isaac Obsourne was given the task of man marking his former team-mate Peter Pawlett.
Piccolo endured a torrid afternoon in his previous appearance against the Dons with attacker Calvin Zola’s physicality causing the former Rayo Vallecano defender no end of problems.
It took Zola just five minutes to remind Balatoni of the fact as he rose to meet a Mark Reynolds’s cross but the forward headed over the crossbar.
Zola could have done better with his first chance but he did everything right with his second, connecting perfectly with Jonny Hayes’s cross from the right but Fox pulled off a tremendous one handed block to deny the Dons forward.
It was not one-way traffic towards Fox’s goal, though, and Piccolo went close to giving his side the lead with their first attempt at goal but his shot was blocked by Zola.
The near-miss sparked the Dons into life.
Aaron Taylor-Sinclair fouled Hayes to concede a free kick and from 23 yards Niall McGinn curled the ball over the wall and past the outstretched left hand of the Jags goalkeeper.
Jags manager Archibald, however, would be quite within his rights to question Stuart Bannigan’s decision not to at least attempt a jump to clear the shot, which just beat his head by inches. The joy on McGinn’s face was clear for all to see with the superb strike the Northern Ireland international’s first goal for the club since August 24.
A goal to the good, the Dons quickly settled into their play and doubled their lead five minutes before the break when McGinn played the ball out left to Pawlett, who drove to the byeline before cutting the ball back to Zola and the attacker was on hand to knock the ball into the net despite the attention of Piccolo.
With the Dons cruising, Pawlett was fortunate to escape with a booking just before half-time following a tackle on Partick’s Kallum Higginbotham. The former Falkirk player was equally lucky not to see red for kicking out in retaliation.
For all their enterprising play and neat passing the visitors were crucially lacking an edge in the final third.
Indeed, with an hour played Dons goalkeeper Langfield had been a virtual spectator. His first call of action came from a Taylor-Sinclair free kick which was straight at the Dons goalkeeper.
But the mark of a good team is having the ability to snuff out sides and the Dons did just that in spectacular fashion as Hector collected possession 25 yards from goal and left fly with a terrific rising shot which flew past the stranded Fox to make it 3-0.
Jags almost pulled a goal back immediately through Higginbotham, who tried his luck from the kick-off. His audacious effort beat Langfield but came back of the crossbar.
Higginbotham tested Langfield again soon after with a deflected effort but the goalkeeper managed to turn his looping effort round the post.
McGinn almost created a fourth for Hayes in the final 10 minutes but Tayloe-Sinclair managed to deflect the Dubliner’s goalbound effort with a fine sliding challenge. Hayes made amends, though, with his dummy setting up Hector, who crossed for McGinn to grab his second of the game with four minutes remaining with a fine first-time shot.