Winning...for now. The Northeast Optimism Records thread.

[OxfordDon]

Right, there's far too much giddy positivity flying about at the moment, this isn't like us - our forebears must be rustling in their graves at the heights of unfettered hyperbole being voiced just because we are not currently bottom of the league.

So to get us back to our roots, here are our current achievements properly grounded in Aberdonian pragmatism. Some key milestones so far:

Wins: we've secured enough wins to avoid beating the all-time record for fewest in a season (7 wins, 1916-17).  So just joint holders for now.

Points: In a similar vein, we've successfully dodged the tag of worst points total ever (21 points, 1904-5, 1916-17).  Some way to go for the comparable 3points-a-win season record though (34 points, 2003-4), so don't get too carried away.

Managers (league wins):  Jimmy Thelin (7 in 8 ) is officially better than Neil Warnock (0 in 6), and is steadily closing in on such managerial behemoths as Stephen Glass (9 in 29), Alex Miller (10 in 38). and Jim Goodwin (11 in 35).

So well done Aberdeen... for now.

[Reekie_Red]

We are due a defeat. So when it comes, we should pre-empt our inevitable downfall by binning Thelin 

[Tyrant]

JMG

 

Might as well bin him now. He's bound to lose games eventually. 

[OxfordDon]

Thelin now officially just as good a manager as Alex Miller (10 Aberdeen career league wins).  

 

Admittedly Jimmy was slightly quicker than the year it took Alex.

[OxfordDon]

I've been reliably informed that our bubble has now burst, so in line with meeting this new benchmark of optimism a quick update on where we stand:

• Currently still on target to set the worst points total in club history - we just need to make sure we don't gain another 3 points across the rest of the season.
• Jim Goodwin is still officially a better manager (11 wins).
• We remain yet to win a game in Europe this season, our longest winless streak since December 2023.

[Reekie_Red]

On 30/11/2024 at 10:01, OxfordDon said:

I've been reliably informed that our bubble has now burst, so in line with meeting this new benchmark of optimism a quick update on where we stand:

• Currently still on target to set the worst points total in club history - we just need to make sure we don't gain another 3 points across the rest of the season.
• Jim Goodwin is still officially a better manager (11 wins).
• We remain yet to win a game in Europe this season, our longest winless streak since December 2023.

Right, that's it. JT oot 

[OrlandoDon]

Figured I’d throw this in here but for now, so what has gone wrong?? Conceding a horrendous number of goals and we can’t score. But why??

defenders - making horrendous mistakes, costing goals. We weren’t punished on on our winning run, teams missed chances, now we are being punished. Don’t know how ruby continues in the team (for now at least), probably tobers and dorrington in central defense in the near future. Tobers has been positive, not sure on dorrington. Would honestly like to see devlin given a week or two rest, play Jensen right and Mackenzie left for a game or two until he gets his freshness back. Haven’t seen many attacking devlin runs and goals of early season, fatigue??

midfield. Think we stick with topi and okkels wide. Okkels looked much better yesterday, topi is much more confident/aggressive than morris. As much as it’s not working for topi at present, I don’t fault his effort.
Central think it has to be shinnie and palaversa. Sivert is just not the early season player he was, he’s not dominating games, makes too many mistakes, and isn’t mobile enough to recover. I thought palaversa was decent yesterday. 

10 has to be gueye, he was lively and had chances yesterday. He has good movement, decent skill strength and pace, is creative,  needs minutes and sharpness. 
9 is the killer, we need to sign one asap as none are good enough. This is huge for our season.

The rest of the squad have to bring a positive impact when brought on. Didn’t see that yesterday. 
Consistency - been too much chopping and changing, I’d say mainly due to injury over form. But on our run we didn’t change much, have to get back to consistency. Good to get one game a week where we can train, work on tactics, and familiarity.

tactics -

got to be able to keep the ball, that’s huge. But we can’t do that at present. But every week it’s different players, harder to develop chemistry and understanding, especially when new players who haven’t yet trained much.

got to have a solid cohesive unit at the back, we had a back up keeper and three new defenders yesterday who have played little together, that’s hard to expect immediate understanding. Work on tobers and dorrington in the middle and devlin Jensen and Mackenzie outside, you can train that 5 be a solid group, but it doesn’t happen immediately. Tougher when your better keeper is injured.

We have to be creative in the final third. We’ve had so much rotation and change of personnel in the last two months, makes that hard for consistency, even understanding. Coincides with midweek games where we don’t train nearly as much. Big part of this is having a 9 as a focal point, and we’ve seen duk gueye Ambrose nisbet and sokler there. McGrath clarkson duk nisbet gueye at 10. Impossible to be strong/consistent up top when it’s different personnel almost weekly.

summary for me, and this is where I will defend JT. Need a consistent 11 to perform consistently, and impact subs. He’s looking for answers while players are injured or have lost form, plus it’s not his full squad. Still dealing with underperforming inconsistent players we should have punted in seasons past. Let him build a squad and tactics with his players, that takes time. We didn’t allow glass Goodwin or Robson time, I still believe JT is a long term project and he’ll be given time. Just looking forward to a win and a stable team. Repeating myself, but once the window closes I think we’ll see a consistent 11, and I believe performances will improve. Too much change over the last 2 months has hurt us.

 

[Reekie_Red]

Individuals are costing us. Rubi's too slow, doesn't have enough skill, and is prone to too many absolutely catastrophic blunders. He's never looked comfortable unless it is against lower league opposition.

And there is no competent #9. This is the position we need to spend big on in this window. Not too many days left though, but we probably need to break our inbound transfer record to land a proven #9 ... 

On a side-note, is our inbound record for Bernard? Or was it Winters when we gave Dodds + cash to Utd? 

[RicoS321]

I guess that the question remains on whether we are going to give Thelin time to implement "the plan" or not, or whether that plan can transcend managers if he's deemed not good enough. The bigger question would be if that plan is even possible on our budget and in Scottish football where teams play each other four times per season, and with the fans on the team's back (witness the booing of Rubi at the weekend). 

What Thelin is trying is what Glass tried. In my opinion it's going to take years to get to the stage where we can play the passing game from front to back consistently and across a whole season, if it's at all possible. It means that not only our first eleven has to be able to do it, but our whole squad. I don't remember a single team outside the scum since the changes to European football that could do that. We can probably carry one or two players if we're on a good run, but the Huns are spending 3-4 times what we're doing and really struggled with a few injuries earlier this season, which gives a good illustration on where we need to be. Despite the claims about how terrible a team the Huns are, they'll still comfortably hit 80 points this season, as well as match some good teams in Europe. 

I don't think it's relevant to focus on individual players, or even positions, when discussing the plan, because I think that kind of short termism misses the point and gets us back to sacking managers. It's up to the club to really focus on managing fans expectations in that regard, and up until now they've simply hung a succession of managers out to dry. It strikes me that Thelin is the one having to talk about strategy and the like, and I find that concerning. 

With that in mind, I find it worrying that we haven't recruited the technical director that was advised after the Warnock debacle. From the outside, it appears that we might be ceding control to the manager in key areas again, heading back towards the McInnes model (see the promotion of Thelin's preferred recruitment guy). We're definitely not at a point where we've got the backroom to handle a crisis and allow the manager some room to breathe. We've just gone into a game with four right sided players defence, largely down to the way we've conducted our signings in this window. There should be someone at the club with the authority to question that before it happens. The recruitment team should have the independence, level of authority and ability to question that. If they're actually scouting players, then they should be able to tell the difference between a player who is a left back, over a player who can play left back (and the same for left sided centre half). The Dorrington signing is perplexing in the circumstances. If MacKenzie is to leave this week, then the Jensen signing is ludicrous. It reeks of a manager seeing a player or players they like and then signing them because they're good, rather than because they fit into the side or we need them. We saw this regularly under the free reign of McInnes, it was almost a fear of missing out on a particular player. There should be someone there who at the very least can question the logic of what appears to be a very basic error. Again, I'm not criticising the particular players, just using them to illustrate the point. They both look like good players playing out of position. 

Anyway, I quite like the ambition behind the strategy, it's quite ballsy, and it's so far being backed with some funds. In my opinion it'll take significantly more money and time. The 50-60% recruitment success still applies, regardless of the amount you spend, and we're not spending enough that a dud - say, Ambrose (sorry, I said I wouldn't focus on individuals, but fucking hell) - will still manage to do a decent job against most teams. If you took someone like Dessers at the scum as an example of a player roundly laughed at - he'll still get plenty of goals and would walk into most sides in the division. What we have to be cognisant of is the fact that the strategy, if successful, only really gets us up to finishing with 70+ points regularly and occasionally hitting 80. It doesn't actually win us a league, nor even second without relying on the Huns fucking up when we peak. The cup will be a lottery that might go our way, still. I'm not sure that people really understand that. I'm not sure they really apply critical thinking and look at our budget for what it is. I'm not sure people have the patience for any of it. We're basically relying on Cormack having the strength and drive to see it through and continue to sell it to the fans. 

[Jute]

Quiet day at work Rico?

I do agree that not having the technical director in place is maybe starting to look a little odd now and was something that should have been done before manager was hired. In Germany it is the technical/sporting director that drives the club policy and ethos and he is the man responsible for getting in the coach to work towards achieving that. Technical director should also be involved in setting recruitment policy. 
 

I doubt we are scouting a lot of these players. I suspect they are identified off the analytics only rather than a combination of both. For example I cannot believe anyone went and watched Ambrose and thought he would do a job in our league. We seem to be signing a combination of players already known to the manager or players whose stats tick a box. Transfers this window do not seem to have been focused on areas of greatest need. 

[RicoS321]

1 hour ago, Jute said:

Quiet day at work Rico?

I do agree that not having the technical director in place is maybe starting to look a little odd now and was something that should have been done before manager was hired. In Germany it is the technical/sporting director that drives the club policy and ethos and he is the man responsible for getting in the coach to work towards achieving that. Technical director should also be 
 

I doubt we are scouting a lot of these players. I suspect they are identified off the analytics only rather than a combination of both. For example I cannot believe anyone went and watched Ambrose and thought he would do a job in our league. We seem to be signing a combination of players already known to the manager or players whose stats tick a box. Transfers this window do not seem to have been focused on areas of greatest need. 

Working is for losers.

Ambrose is a very strange one. Normally you can see an attribute in a player that you think that someone must have spotted, but I just don't see any redeeming features with him. Guys like Morris, Richardson, Keskinen, Gueye etc all have skills that you think could be utilised, with the other parts of their game being worked on to hopefully transform them. Even guys like McGarry, Richard Jensen etc are completely understandable signings, because they are not terrible footballers, it's just that they operate at a level just below what we need, and it's not an exact science when transferring from one league to another (hopefully that's where we feed our data back into the models for signing again from those leagues). 

I agree with you, I think the analytics and videos are probably playing too big a role, and whilst I have no issue with Thelin signing 2-3 players he knows, I hope that there is a limit to that too. This has been happening since McInnes was here though, it seems ridiculous that the technical director role has been pushed to the background. The evidence very much suggests that there is nobody raising the right questions from above. Of course, we have a few days left of the window, and I know that transfers don't always go as scheduled, and it's likely that a couple of new faces would very much change the dynamic. We'll probably sign another number 10 and a right sided centre back.

[OrlandoDon]

Replying to this window being about needs not being addressed. We don’t know that, we may have targets we cannot get until summer for example, and rather spend on less or a loan, we wait. We also may have signed Jensen as a player who plays multiple positions, including competition for devlin, even center mid, but he’s started left back for a reason. Perhaps dorrington is good enough for now? I think it’s also a little harsh judging a 19 yr old so quickly, plus I think he rolled his ankle on Saturday but played on which may have affected things.

think we sometimes blow the left footer argument out of proportion at times. Think mcleish and miller were both right footed, rougvie was right I think. Cooper Simpson bell, later on bett all right. Different times and different game then I know. If you are good enough it doesn’t matter though, is blaming right or left foot a cop out for a bigger issue ie not good enough? Or do we expect instant perfection in a team in both transition and turmoil. 
not addressing immediate needs immediately suggests bigger picture and signing when available. Also suggest long term for JT who may wait for targets until the summer?

[RicoS321]

1 minute ago, OrlandoDon said:

Replying to this window being about needs not being addressed. We don’t know that, we may have targets we cannot get until summer for example, and rather spend on less or a loan, we wait. We also may have signed Jensen as a player who plays multiple positions, including competition for devlin, even center mid, but he’s started left back for a reason. Perhaps dorrington is good enough for now? I think it’s also a little harsh judging a 19 yr old so quickly, plus I think he rolled his ankle on Saturday but played on which may have affected things.

think we sometimes blow the left footer argument out of proportion at times. Think mcleish and miller were both right footed, rougvie was right I think. Cooper Simpson bell, later on bett all right. Different times and different game then I know. If you are good enough it doesn’t matter though, is blaming right or left foot a cop out for a bigger issue ie not good enough? Or do we expect instant perfection in a team in both transition and turmoil. 
not addressing immediate needs immediately suggests bigger picture and signing when available. Also suggest long term for JT who may wait for targets until the summer?

If you haven't seen the absolute disaster we've had with right footed centre backs playing on the left, I don't know what to tell you. We're telling our centre backs to play out from the back and take risks in possession. Even Nilsen, an experienced midfielder, completely struggled. If we were playing pragmatic football, where we're happy for the defender just to play a percentage ball down the line for the forward to run the channel, then it's absolutely fine to have a defender on the wrong side. It's also absolutely fine to play a guy there if we have no other options. I acknowledged the fact that the window is still open and we have to accept that the market doesn't always work in the order it was meant. Jensen will be useful cover for Devlin and MacKenzie, but if MacKenzie leaves without a left sided fullback, then it'll be negligence. That is absolutely not a criticism of Jensen (as far as I can tell nobody has criticised him yet? Although I'd say he was a little bit weak in the tackle at the weekend, but that can be getting up to speed). Also yet to be criticised is Dorrington. You seem to be mistaking criticism of the signing over criticism of the player, despite the fact I made it quite clear. Anyone watching Dorrington in his games so far can see he's not a left sided centre back. He's right footed, he runs with the ball on his right and his body shape is that of a right footer. He did have a nice pass with his left on Saturday, but that's a far cry from playing as a left footer. Again, completely fine if you're not expected to be carrying it forward and moving it quickly. It's the SPFL, managers are very quick to pick up on any weakness, and Dorrington will just be closed down even quicker and it'll lead to mistakes. He is already taking extra touches to get it onto his right, just as MacDonald, Rubi and Nilsen were before him. Moving the ball forward quickly is absolutely fundamental to how Thelin wants to play. Again, nothing to do with Dorrington himself, but he's also a loanee for six months, not a guy we're investing in like Jensen. We knew we had a left centre back missing, we should be replacing with a left centre back. The loan system from down South generally has a lot of availability, I don't believe there wasn't a player available. Once again, if we sign a defender before the window closes and he's just backup for Tobers, then fine I suppose, although I don't think it's the best use of resources in a January window. 

[DantheDon]

I hear this young guy Timothy Akindileni who QPR are trying to sign from us is a left sided center back. I know he’s young but if that’s what we need maybe we should offer him game time to stay. Can’t be any worse than Ruby. 

[Elgindon]

Joined us in 2023(boyhood Dons fan apprently)been a standout in youth games and on the first team bench a few times,but hasnt yet signed a professional contract.Be weird to lose someone at that age...

[Jute]

Has Akindileni not just turned 17? Think most would have questioned a 17 year old playing at centre back regularly. 
 

As an aside this does highlight an issue where English clubs are targeting players coming out of Scottish clubs academy sides that seems to be increasing again. This will be second player we have lost to English Championship teams in last year. 

[RicoS321]

4 hours ago, Jute said:

As an aside this does highlight an issue where English clubs are targeting players coming out of Scottish clubs academy sides that seems to be increasing again. This will be second player we have lost to English Championship teams in last year. 

Aye, what are the rules on that? I don't mean this particular move, but more generally. Are English teams subject to the same rules as the rest of Europe, or can they raid Scotland on the cheap? Does it differ from a Scotland to Scotland transfer? I'm assuming we'd be due compensation even though he hasn't signed a professional contract?

[Jute]

Think it counts as cross border. There will be some compensation due but not a huge amount.