I was very impressed by Aberdeen’s performance against St Mirren in their first home Premiership game.
During the flawless League Cup campaign, it was hard to judge how the summer rebuild had improved the Dons, due to the lower-league opposition they were coming up against, so I decided to suspend judgement. It was a similar feeling I had following the league-opening away loss at Celtic.
However, they were excellent in their 4-1 victory over the Buddies.
Some of the football was very, very good.
They’ve still got a wee bit more heating up before you would say Goodwin’s new-look side were really cooking on full gas, but they look really fit and they’re hunting as a pack both in and out of possession.
For a group of players who have only been together a matter of weeks in some cases, it’s looking promising.
In young midfielder Leighton Clarkson’s case, he’d only been in the Granite City for a few hours after arriving on loan from Liverpool, but he still put in a great performance off the bench – the peak of which was his stunning debut goal.
🚀 🤯
WHAT. A. GOAL
👏🏽 Leighton Clarkson.#StandFree | #cinchPrem pic.twitter.com/4mz4FIP3bL
— Aberdeen FC (@AberdeenFC) August 7, 2022
He seemed to slot in perfectly alongside another summer addition, Ylber Ramadani, in the middle of the park, with both players’ qualities – Ramadani in the deeper role keeping the ball moving and Clarkson as a more aggressive, attacking middle-man – complementing each other.
But Clarkson looked superb in his own right – despite being thrown on sooner than expected, he was all about forward passing, trying to make things happen, going for goal despite having missed with an earlier attempt… How good is that for someone so young and new to the side?
There’s still an element of Aberdeen having to walk in the weeks ahead before they can run and we can’t yet make any predictions about what will happen this season, but there are already signs the Dons have the quality to give them upper-hand over every team in the Premiership outside the top two.
What’s important this weekend, against a Motherwell side who have been in turmoil, is the Dons show the capacity to string results together – something which was missing last season and at times in prior seasons.
This Saturday, they need to again prove they have the quality to be up challenging near the top of the table by notching another result against a team fans will expect them beat.
It’s safe to say Aberdeen certainly owe the Steelmen, who had the sign over them last term in the league and also put the Reds out of the Scottish Cup.
You can’t win every game, but over the course of the campaign, you’d like to see the Dons at least picking up a point in all of their matches at Pittodrie.
Victory over Well would represent another step forward, as it would mean Goodwin’s first back-to-back league wins as boss.
I’d also like to see an early clean sheet in the league – because shut-outs were hard to come by for the club last term and it was slightly unfortunate St Mirren got the chance to net a consolation from the penalty spot last weekend.
I built a career on the anticipation Bojan Miovski showed against the Buddies
Bojan Miovski maybe left Pittodrie on Saturday kicking himself he hadn’t completed his first Aberdeen hat-trick.
However, despite a couple of moments of hesitation in the second period against St Mirren, the North Macedonian couldn’t really have asked for more on his home Premiership debut – having demonstrated his predatory instincts with his two goals in the first half.
The opening penalty, awarded after ex-Don Declan Gallagher was sent off for a deliberate handball, was another demonstration of Miovski’s deadly accuracy from 12 yards, while the second goal delighted me.
He anticipated where the ball was going to come, despite a deflection, nipping in front of the uncertain Trevor Carson to flick it home.
I built my career on that in-built instinct – sometimes lurking behind four or five opposition players just knowing the ball would make it through them all and I’d be able to tuck it away.
🇲🇰 9⃣
⚽ A striker's instinct from Bojan for his second goal yesterday. #StandFree | @bojanmiovskii pic.twitter.com/u5U839w0lA
— Aberdeen FC (@AberdeenFC) August 7, 2022
It was brilliant to see the same movement and awareness from Miovski.
I thought last season Christian Ramirez anticipated well, but he’s not as good as this boy – he looks a player, and I think he’ll be a real player for Aberdeen.
Of course, against St Mirren, Ramirez played in Luis Lopes for his first goal for the club. “Duk” is still young and developing, but his chip beyond Trevor Carson and in off the post showed he’s clearly a talented, confident player.
All good strikers should be confident – I was cocky in my day about how I would score every time I took to the field – and it can affect your confidence if you go through a dry spell.
I scored in my second game for the Dons, against Partick Thistle (having been forced to play right-back on my debut), and after that it just became a routine.
So it’s great to see the two forwards Aberdeen have signed this summer both getting off the mark in the league.
Cormack Park chance for ex-players to get closer to current squad
Aberdeen chairman Dave Cormack invited myself and several other ex-Dons players to Cormack Park last Thursday evening.
Bobby Clark was there, along with John Hewitt, Willie Miller and around 15 others.
We were able to have a look around and chat to the chairman about various bits and pieces going on at the club.
During the evening, they said to us we were welcome to go out to Cormack Park whenever we want – carte blanche. We don’t have to make an appointment. If we want to have a bit of lunch in the canteen, we can do that and interact with the current players.
I think it’s a really positive, great thing, and all of the other former Reds who were there seemed to agree with me and we were questioning why the club haven’t done something like this before, which could allow us to share our experiences and things we learned during our own careers with the current generation.
In the past, intentionally or not, the club have kept the current squad away from the ex-players for whatever reasons.
So I’ll probably be going up to the training ground for a coffee now and then.
I might even ask Jim Goodwin if he’ll let me join in at training.
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