None of those? Well, what about Aberdeen, then?
When people talk about the Dons, it tends to be through a bit of a nostalgic haze. Remember those 1980s days when they broke the Old Firm stranglehold? The club Alex Ferguson managed before joining Manchester United? Pittodrie’s Scottish title-winners? Aberdeen triumphing in Europe?
It’s all a long time ago, but maybe we’re on the brink of some sort of sequel.
You have to go back to 1983-84 for the last time Aberdeen won the Scottish league title, but now they’re top and four points clear of Celtic — and although the defending champions have a couple of games in hand, Aberdeen are flying.
Their last eight Scottish Premier League games have all brought victories and clean sheets. That’s 630 minutes of league football in which Aberdeen haven’t conceded a goal. Their last winless league game, a 2-1 setback at home to Celtic, came in early November.
That sort of defensive defiance is unmatched anywhere: only French outfit St Etienne and Moldovan club Milsami can come close. St Etienne have strung together a sequence of six clean sheets and Milsami seven.
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“I’ve always wanted to better myself and push myself as hard as I can, and I thought I could do that with Aberdeen. A big part of the appeal was to have [legendary Aberdeen goalkeeper] Jim Leighton working with me as goalkeeper coach.”
It’s all a far cry from earlier in the season, when McInnes was getting hot under the collar… because Aberdeen were conceding too many avoidable goals.
Speaking after a 3-0 defeat at Hamilton Academical in October, he said: “We as a team know we can’t go through the season losing cheap goals if we want to be successful. Losing soft goals is something that has to be dealt with.
“We need to make better decisions, and we need to show far more determination when we are defending.”
Now Aberdeen are targeting the world’s best winning league streak currently held by Uruguay’s Nacional with 12 consecutive victories.
