When things aren’t going your way, football generally finds a way of passing the sword into the hands of the most ironic assailant to deliver the final blow.
Aberdeen cannot have been entirely surprised at being slain by the circumstantially unfortunate former Don Stevie May last weekend, but as they watched his almost entirely unproductive former teammate wheeling away to herald another unsuccessful afternoon they must have felt the world had turned against them.
Whether the ball made any contact with Curtis Main’s head on its match-settling journey into the Aberdeen net is open to debate, but he is unquestionably responsible for the goal. His name may not ultimately show on the scoresheet, but without his proximity it would have been the easiest of collections for Joe Lewis.
For the game to be decided by a centre-forward seemingly not getting on the end of a cross will have been especially galling for the Dons, given their own striker’s extraordinarily decisive meeting of a delivery had previously put them in pole position.
As in Reykjavik, Aberdeen may lament having turned over a trump card from their set-piece hand without receiving adequate reward, for the only thing more forceful than Christian Ramirez’s gymnastic header was the fly bodycheck by which his intended marker was prevented from tracking him. Referees inevitably watch highlights and it is perhaps unlikely the Reds will get away with that move again.
Given how difficult they have found it to come by goals – and points – by conventional means, Stephen Glass and Allan Russell will rue using up both their dead-ball creativity and their proverbial goal off someone’s backside in another losing cause.
For the fixtures do not get any easier from here. After a winless September, if October follows suit then things could start to get scary by Halloween.
