Last weekend’s loss to Dundee United at Tannadice spelt the end for Aberdeen’s title challenge. Although they have been kept at arms length for the majority of 2015 by the eventual champions, Celtic, it was a brave effort from Derek McInnes and his players. Due to Rangers’ demise, nobody has come close to challenging the Hoops in the last three years, so this campaign has been kept more interesting, for longer, due to the Dons consistency. They lost only half a dozen games before the league split in two, which was just two less than Celtic – whom everybody expected to steamroll their way to a fourth consecutive league title. Despite missing out on their first championship in 1985, this season will be the first time Aberdeen will finish in the top two in over 20 years.
Celtic wrapped up another title without even playing, last Saturday. Ronny Delia’s team defeated Dundee 5-0 at Celtic Park the night before but benefited from Aberdeen’s slip-up on the Saturday, resulting in the Hoops winning a double – having won the League Cup in March – in Deila’s first season. There is no doubt Celtic have been the best team in Scotland, once again, and have deservedly finished at the top of the table, but there will also be a determination to put this weekend’s opponents in their place, so to speak. Their form in the first couple of games since split has been very impressive, scoring eight and yet to concede in two games. It now means they have scored more than 20 goals than anybody else, and conceded 13 less than the team with the second best defensive record – Aberdeen.
There has been plenty of talk amongst the Aberdeen staff and players over the last couple of weeks about the importance of beating Celtic in this fixture. It was initially because this game could well have been the match whereby the visitors could clinch the league title and the Dons players were determined to avoid that at all costs. Now the league title has been sewn up it has become a case of showing Celtic – and the rest of the country – that this season is not a one-off, and that Aberdeen are going to be a credible challenger for the foreseeable future. It remains to be seen if they will be, or not, but it’s certainly a factor that will motivate McInnes and his players on Sunday.
Sometimes, when a team has just clinched a league title, the manager will look to rest a lot of players after a long hard season. I think – with Champions League qualifiers due to begin as early as July for Celtic – that Delia would certainly give some of stars a prolonged holiday but the circumstances surrounding this match leads me to believe that he will try and get one last game with a close to full-strength team. The Hoops will have two more games left to play after this weekend’s game and it will likely be the matches against St Johnstone and Inverness where some of the fringe players get a chance, as Celtic will want to send out a message to Aberdeen and the Scottish Premiership as a whole.
In the three previous meetings between the two this season, Celtic have won all of them. Aberdeen will feel hard done by, particularly in the first two games when a single goal separated the two teams. Other than the loss to Celtic back November, they have only tasted defeated at home one more time which was in August. It’s an indication of how strong they have been at Pittodrie and they will be hoping their excellent home record continues on Sunday. Celtic look like finishing the season in a very strong fashion, however, and despite wrapping up the title I expect them to be extremely motivated to take another three points here and complete the sweep for the season against Aberdeen. The odds of an away win looks pretty attractive to me and that will be my main selection.
The other bet I like in this match is for there to be a few bookings. There has been a total of 13 yellow cards and one red in the three meetings this season, and with so many of the players – and both managers – speaking so publicly about the rivalry head of this match, I can see another busy afternoon for the referee and his assistants.
