Chaos, defensive calamities and another confidence-sapping defeat.
That about sums up not only Aberdeen’s latest loss, but their season as a whole following last night’s 3-2 defeat to Celtic at Pittodrie.
From being woeful in the first half, the Dons rallied when they had nothing to lose, got back on level terms then contrived to lose the game almost instantly.
For all their troubles on the road this season, Pittodrie has, by and large, offered the comforts of home for the Dons as they faced a Celtic team on the back of a five-game unbeaten run in the Granite City.
But it paled in comparison to the 23-game unbeaten domestic run in all competitions the league leaders boasted as they stepped on to the pitch in Aberdeen.
It is all the more remarkable when you consider the Hoops ended an eight-month run without an away win when they beat the Dons in October.
While Ange Postecoglou’s side have found a rhythm, his counterpart Stephen Glass and his team are dropping down the Scottish Premiership.
Glass changed formation for the visit of the Hoops at Pittodrie last night, switching to a 3-5-2 formation. It worked for all of 17 minutes.
Most concerning of all was within three minutes the Dons’ plight had worsened further and they were 2-0 down.
For a team which struggles to score goals and cannot keep the back door closed, it looked to be effectively game over.
It’s a measure of the confidence, or lack of it, that Aberdeen failed to lay a glove on the Hoops in their attempts to pull a goal back before the interval.
Second half rally came up short
Glass made a double change at the interval against the Hoops and it brought a much-improved display, with Christian Ramirez’s 14th goal of the season sparking the Dons back into life before Lewis Ferguson headed home to make it 2-2.
The joy was shortlived, however, as Jota put Celtic back in the lead almost immediately. The Dons, for all their efforts, could not come back again.
The Reds were not alone in being beaten by this Celtic team. Rangers and Motherwell both suffered the same fate in the last week alone.
But it is of little consolation to a Red Army which is teetering on the brink of all-out revolt and the chants, albeit brief, calling for the manager to go emanated from the Red Shed following Matt O’Riley’s deflected effort to make it 2-0.
Awful first half cannot be ignored
The second half display changed that outlook on the night and Glass and his players can take some solace from their second half showing.
But the opening 45 minutes cannot be ignored and again points to Aberdeen’s single greatest issue at this point of the season.
They are so unpredictable and the only thing we can be sure of is that the results, not for the first time this season, are not coming the Dons’ way.
An improvement in November and December looks like papering over the cracks of what so far looks a disjointed mess.
Two away wins in the league and one point from a possible 12 in the last four matches does little to repair any of the fragility of a side which is now heading to Fir Park on Motherwell on Scottish Cup duty.
Defeat to the Steelmen, who are on a poor run themselves but have beaten the Dons twice this season, would put a nail in Aberdeen’s hopes of salvaging the ongoing rollercoaster of a campaign with a trip to Hampden.
