Change of Plan
Mixing it up
Aberdeen secured a vital 2-1 victory over Dundee at Dens Park. Well-taken goals from Nisbet (illustrating his excellent striking nous) and Keskinen (what an exciting young talent we have) put the Reds two ahead and seemingly on easy-street. A rare defensive lapse let Dundee back into the game. The Dons were made to work but the left-footed Ginger and the Eastern European at the heart of the back four stood up to the task and the team saw the game out for a gritty win on the road in front of boisterous traveling support.
The Narrative
That little summary of course refers to Aberdeen’s victory over Dundee on September 28th. It was the third away win of the season, and until, Saturday, the last time the Dons had won on the road. Nine away games later, we finally have another victory to celebrate.
Understandably, we’re all breathing a major sigh of relief. Coupled with the return to third place, the bedding in of some new signings and it feels like a turning point. But, as the match earlier in the season proves, it might be dangerous to draw too many conclusions from a ‘gritty’ win at Dens.
Here are my headlines from Dundee 1 Aberdeen 2.
Doohan Takes the Long Road
Sometimes graphs can be more efficient than words.
As you can see Doohan did not attempt any short goal-kicks on Saturday.
We can all agree that Jimmy has been fairly rigid in having the team build out from the back in recent months. However, this was not a hallmark of his Elfsborg teams. If you want to read more on all that check out the link below for a post from last month.
Earlier in the season, Aberdeen actually were mixing it up quite a bit too.
I avoided posting this back in January as I was slightly concerned that there may be a conclusion that playing out from the back is costing Aberdeen games.
The club did spend a lot of money in January on two defenders who are better equipped to play out of the back and looked, against Championship opposition, fairly good at it. So just when we think we’ve figured Thelin out, he goes and plays some 4D chess on us.
Only Jimmy, the coaching staff, and the players will know but I think we have to consider that there was a conscious choice on goal kicks this Saturday and indeed on the whole approach. There’s no indication from what I could see of the Dundee press forcing a rethink.
Pass the Test
It wasn’t just goal-kicks. In the second period, Aberdeen only played 23 accurate passes in their own half. This is the second-lowest number of the league season, after the 2-2 draw at Celtic Park.
Aberdeen’s averages for the season are listed below with Saturday’s numbers in brackets:
Passes per game: 433 (353)
Accurate Passes per game: 350 (248)
Completed Percentage 80.81%. (70.25%)
In general, from what we’ve seen of Aberdeen in away games (and home) the focus seems to have been working towards establishing greater control of the game. To wrestle away the potential for chaos and control games like Celtic, with less talent of course. But that was not the case against Dundee.
We also had some long shots. Keskinen’s beauty we can add to the highlight reel when we try and sell him for $3M next summer but also Palaversa’s effort that spun up off a defender and resulted in the corner that led to the first goal.
To what do we determine the cause of this shift in strategy?
There’s a good argument to be made that Pape Gueye’s return has added another target further up the field and the Senegalese forward was targeted successfully from goal kicks on Saturday. Additional factors may be:
Dundee have the worst defensive record in the league, so maybe they wanted to put them under pressure.
The pitch at Dens is not conducive to a short passing game
Aberdeen hadn’t won a league game in 14 attempts and something had to change
The Dons were winning for an hour. They’ve not had the chance to defend a lead for that long, since the last visit to Dundee
Embracing the Chaos
Right now we don’t really have the body of work to to judge which strategy is most effective. This, at least in terms of xG, was another toss-up and I think an argument could easily be made that Dundee could certainly have snatched a draw.
I’ve often wondered what would happen if Celtic chose to play like St. Mirren or Motherwell for a season. Would it make any difference? Would their superior quality just shine through?
This is Thelin’s first year in Scottish football. His focus on building out from the back and prioritising possession may have been part of a wider development of the team. To suffer now to achieve later. The ability to create more flexibility within a team’s approach can also make it harder for the opposition to prepare for.
There aren’t all that many secrets in football anymore but let’s imagine what Derek McInnes might be thinking ahead of Saturday? Does he set his team up to press high or work on defending the second ball? I’d wager that most opposition managers would want Aberdeen to play out.
There’s likely a fine line to be found and it’s unlikely to be a binary choice. If I was the Director of Football at Aberdeen, I’d be spending my days agonizing over that very existential SPFL question. What is the best method to, get to, what 60pts a season consistently? And then how do you get to 65, 70, 75?
On to Killie
Killie away is vying with St. Mirren at home for the most abject display of the league season. I think it might be the top spot for me.
Who knows how Jimmy will approach this one? My guess is somewhere between the two and I think that might be what we get for the rest of the season. Three points would be huge, and almost certainly seal a top-six place.
Aberdeen were due a win and they got one. That’s the long and the short of it. For bigger conclusions, we’ll just have to wait and see.