Aberdeen travel down to the capital on Saturday to complete the first ever round of games in the Scottish Premiership. The Dons fought well and grafted out a result last week against "New Firm" rivals Dundee United and it appears that the same grit and determination will be needed to see of an on form Hibs team albeit their only recent tough task was Celtic last week. This is an important game for both clubs despite it being so early in the season, if the Dons claim all three points they will pull five points ahead of the Edinburgh outfit and would really give out a statement of intent to the rest of the league, however if the men in green prevail they will jump above Aberdeen into fourth place.
For once the Aberdeen injury list is getting shorter and shorter, despite still not being available for Saturday's match both Chris Clark and Josh Magennis have returned to training after being out with knee injuries. Barry Robson is back in the squad and is likely to feature on the bench as the experienced midfielder has had almost no game time since the opening day of the season. Ryan Jack is also fit and ready to go for the game after suffering from fatigue as the 21 year old was away on duty with the Scotland U21s. Derek McInnes will be hoping he can make it two wins in a row tomorrow for Aberdeen and will take heart from the fact the Dons have only lost two of their last sixteen visits to Easter Road. The addition of Willo Flood back into the side will hopefully extend this good run and has generally been a boost to the side overall especially against United last week. Flood will need to be his usual self on Saturday and get in amongst the Hibs defence to hassle and pressure them. If Aberdeen are on their game they could quite easily come away with a convincing result they definitely do have the better quality throughout each area of the pitch, however the question is what Aberdeen team will turn up?
Hibs have their own injury worries and definitely ruled out for the clash with Aberdeen is central defender Michael Nelson after suffering a blow to the head against Celtic last week. Ryan McGivern is fit after shrugging off also picked up against the league leaders. James McPake is expected to start in place for the defender.
The Red Army have once again sold out their 1600 allocated tickets proving we have the best travelling support in Scotland. Their will be cash turnstiles at the game selling a further 400 tickets to Dons fans.
Hibernian v Aberdeen
Sat 26 October 2013
Easter Road Stadium
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