Interim manager Neil Warnock has called for Aberdeen to cut out costly individual gaffes and bad decisions.
Aberdeen have conceded seven goals in the three Premiership matches Warnock has managed since taking over the Pittodrie hot-seat.
He says he has worked hard on the training pitch with the Dons in a bid to cut out the defensive errors.
Warnock has also held discussions with the players in a bid to find a solution to tightening up at the back.
However the veteran gaffer warns there is only so much he can do.
He says ultimately the onus is on the Dons to take responsibility for their own actions by cutting out blunders and making the right decisions.
And Warnock insists that must start away at fourth-placed Kilmarnock on Saturday.
It is a game where the 75-year-old will face Killie boss Derek McInnes who was in the opposition team to Warnock in the infamous Battle of Bramall Lane.
On March 16, 2002 the English second tier clash between Warnock’s Sheffield United and West Bromwich Albion descended into chaos.
It became the first, and still the only, English professional football match to be abandoned due to a lack of players as Warnock’s Sheffield United had three sent off and another two later left the field injured.
Now Warnock will face McInnes again and demands Aberdeen cut out the defensive mistakes.
He said: “The goals we are conceding are individual bad decisions.
“It’s alright working on it and talking about it.
“But players have to make their own decisions.
“You can coach all day but if they carry on like that we are going to concede goals.
“The proof will be in the pudding if they take it on board.”
‘I remember him with a bandage round his head, Derek’
Even 22 years on, the Battle of Bramall Lane remains locked in English football folklore.
In the ninth minute Sheffield United keeper Simon Tracey was sent off by referee Eddie Wolstenholme for deliberately handling outside his penalty box.
Scott Dobie put West Brom 1-0 up soon after before Baggies captain McInnes fired home a spectacular strike.
Warnock responded to going 2-0 down by putting on Patrick Suffo and Georges Santos, withdrawing Gus Uhlenbeek and Michael Tonge.
They were on the pitch for only a minute before being sent off.
Santos first action was an out of control, stud high challenge on Andy Johnson that earned a red card.
It sparked a mass brawl between both sets of players
Fellow sub Suffo headbutted McInnes and was also sent off, with future Aberdeen boss McInnes receiving stitches above his eye.
Santos and Suffo were both given six-match bans and never played for United again.
Warnock said: “I remember him with a bandage round his head, Derek.
“Everything went off that day, head-butts and the lad I put on for one minute he was sent off the next.
“I was never really a big fan of the manager there, we never really got on, me and Gary Megson.
“Georges Santos, the kid did him in the first game, this midfield player.
“I put him on and I said ‘you won’t try anything stupid Georges will you?’
“He said ‘no, no I’m alright’.
“Then the next minute the ball broke between him and this lad who did him, the long-haired midfield player.
“And I just looked and went ‘oh my God’, then looked away.
“I could tell what was coming.”
Chaotic end to Battle of Bramall Lane
West Brom went 3-0 up through Dobie in the 77th minute.
Two minutes later, Michael Brown hobbled off with a groin injury.
Then in the 82nd minute Robert Ullathorne also left the pitch, complaining about muscle spasms.
With only six United players on the pitch and none of their allocated substitutes remaining Sheffield United had insufficient players to continue.
The referee abandoned the match.
Warnock said: “It was so near the end.
“Their manager made a bit of a fuss about it but we just said they should have the points.
“They were winning comfortably anyway so we had no problem with them having the points.
“It wasn’t one of Eddie Wolstenholme’s (referee) better games.
“It’s in the past now – happy days.”
McInnes a contender for manager of the year
The Premiership clash at Rugby Park this weekend will not be the first time Warnock and McInnes have gone face to face since the Battle of Bramall Lane.
While Bristol City manager McInnes lost 3-2 at home to Warnock’s Leeds United in the English Championship on September 29, 2012.
Warnock reckons McInnes should be in the running for manager of the year.
McInnes has led Kilmarnock to fourth in the Premiership and will face the Dons in the Scottish Cup quarter-final on Saturday March 9.
Warnock said: “I watched him (McInnes) up here when he was at Aberdeen and other places.
“And I always thought he was a steady Eddie, a good, steady manager.
“He has done really well there, remarkable.
“Not far off being manager of the season I would imagine.”
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