Aberdeen must get angry and show their aggression and fight after suffering a shocker against Motherwell.
The Dons were outfought and pushed off the ball far too easily in the 3-2 loss to the Steelmen at Pittodrie.
That cannot happen again at St Johnstone on Saturday.
The modern game is built around controlled aggression and the best teams in the world have that embedded in them.
Aberdeen must do the same. They have to hunt in packs against St Johnstone to close the Perth side down and deny them any time on the ball.
They simply didn’t do that against Motherwell in a lacklustre performance where the Reds were all over the place.
There is no excuse for that performance and Aberdeen will hopefully have learnt a valuable lesson from that dismal defeat.
Motherwell must be a blip because Aberdeen cannot afford to play as bad as that often.
If they do they will end up in the same unwanted position they were last season.
In the recent 4-1 defeat of St Mirren, the Reds did everything right as they scored good goals, were aggressive and won comfortably.
You have to fight and work hard as a team, which the Dons did against St Mirren.
After such a positive start to the season, it felt like a black cloud descended on Pittodrie when losing to Motherwell.
Now Aberdeen must pick themselves up and bring back the sunshine for the supporters.
I was shocked at the performance from the Dons against ‘Well.
It wasn’t just a defeat, it was a drubbing.
Aberdeen’s defence and midfield were all at sea in a performance that was night and day from the defeat of St Mirren.
How a team can go from being so dominant to being so poor in just seven days is baffling.
It is a concern Aberdeen’s defence have also conceded in the opening three Premiership matches of the season.
The hope was that the defence would be far stronger after the summer rebuild.
There has been much change over the summer to the back-line, but they have to gel quickly to start delivering clean sheets.
Hopefully the Motherwell defeat is a sobering wake up call for Aberdeen and they will quickly get back on track against St Johnstone.
There was a real buzz after the comprehensive defeat of St Mirren and fans are back in numbers at Pittodrie… then the Reds delivered a set-back with that poor performance.
The manner of the defeat to Motherwell was so shocking because all the new signings had done well up until then.
There has been a major summer rebuild with 11 players signed and it looked to be clicking pretty quickly – until Motherwell.
It was a knock, but the Dons are only three games into the Premiership campaign so it is very early days.
They have a run of games in August where Aberdeen can build up some momentum again.
After St Johnstone, they host Livingston in the Premiership before a trip to League Two Annan Athletic in the Premier Sports Cup.
If the Reds can rack up three wins out of three before the end of August, it would go a long way to wiping out memories of Motherwell.
Positive goal return from Miovski
Summer signing Bojan Miovski has made an impressive start to his Aberdeen career.
North Macedonian international striker Miovski is already starting to show why the Dons splashed out £535,000 to sign him from MTK Budapest.
He scored just six minutes into his debut against Raith Rovers in the Premier Sports Cup.
Miovski also netted a double in the 4-1 defeat of St Mirren at Pittodrie.
Although the Reds were terrible in the loss to Motherwell, at least Miovski pitched in with a superb header to make it 1-1.
His second goal against St Mirren was a great finish.
Miovski was on the edge of the 18-yard box when Jonny Hayes got the ball on the right flank.
He raced into the box to meet Hayes’ cross. Miovski bravely got in front of the goal-keeper to meet the ball and it paid off with a goal.
His goal against Motherwell was also impressive.
🇲🇰 9⃣
⚽ A striker's instinct from Bojan for his second goal yesterday. #StandFree | @bojanmiovskii pic.twitter.com/u5U839w0lA
— Aberdeen FC (@AberdeenFC) August 7, 2022
All the new signings have shown signs they can be strong additions to the squad this season.
Aberdeen boss Jim Goodwin has introduced a host of signings in a hectic summer transfer window. That was always going to take time to gel.
Hopefully the ‘Well defeat was a one-off and the new signings will all shine.
Positive talk but actions needed
A targeted major rise in annual distributable income to SPFL clubs is welcome news.
A review of the league’s commercial operations by Deloitte was commissioned by Aberdeen, Dundee, Dundee United, Hearts and Hibernian.
They hope to raise distributable income from £28.4 million to £50m by 2029.
It’s an ambitious figure that if delivered will benefit all the clubs.
However, the proof of the pudding will be in the action.
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