Why Aberdeen FC are no third place outsiders as dressing room vibe shows one thing needed for European return bid

Ryan Duncan believes Aberdeen are starting to regain their Pittodrie mojo and knows it has to remain a fortress if they want to storm back into the race for third place.

The Dons have won their last two home games against Hearts and Livingston and they will be looking to make it a hat-trick when struggling Motherwell come visiting this afternoon. Aberdeen have made a sluggish start to the Premiership campaign, due to their gruelling European adventures, but have two games in hand, which if they were to win would cut the gap on third-placed Hearts to four points.

Duncan said: “We have had a lot of games with Europe and the cup games, but Europe is over now so we want to be climbing the table. Is third still achievable? Of course, but we just have to take it a game at a time and see what happens. The last two games at home in the league we’ve won, so we’re looking forward to the Motherwell game now.

“We want to make it three in a row and make Pittodrie somewhere people don’t like playing. We want to make it a fortress and have people not wanting to play us there.”

Aberdeen missed out on possible points after Saturday’s late call off at Dundee. “It was really frustrating to travel down and be changed for the match then it gets called off,” Duncan added.

“But there was nothing we could do, the ref decided it wasn’t playable. We were all ready to go out for the warm up in 20 minutes or so then were told it was off.

“The pitch didn’t look great when we were on it when we arrived and apparently the ball wasn’t bouncing much when the ref tried it. It’s unfortunate because we wanted to be playing and hopefully building more momentum.”

The young winger has been one of the main beneficiaries from Barry Robson’s time in charge.