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Fan view: It’s only taken slick and confident Aberdeen 10 days to chase down Premiership rivals

Aberdeen have emerged from a disrupted start to the season
Aberdeen have emerged from a disrupted start to the season

When the fixture list for this most abnormal of seasons was released, it could at best have been described as provisional.

There could be no guarantees whether any or all of them would even take place; a question whose answer remained unclear yesterday until just hours before kick-off, pending the outcome of an early-morning inspection of an entirely different kind to that to which Scottish football is used.

But this match would have been one around which both clubs will have drawn a large pencil circle.

Events since March left a lot of Premiership clubs with no choice but to merely patch holes and minimise personnel damage, but of all the likely podium challengers Aberdeen and Hibs seemed to sense the moment as an opportunity to take a relative leap forward.

These were the two clubs to make conspicuous additions to their squads, and as such they represent good benchmarks for one another as they seek to evaluate their places in the new normal pecking order.

To that end, the Dons will have been encouraged by the extent to which they were able to play the match on the front foot: aggressive and disciplined against the ball, but poised and graceful on it.

That hasn’t always been the case at Easter Road, and is a marked improvement on Aberdeen’s only visit here last season when they were blown away by a green storm.

Much of the early-season talk surrounded Hibs, while the Dons’ off-field headline makers were idle, but on this evidence a slick and confident Aberdeen are hitting a quick stride.

If they were ever concerned about the head start they were giving their rivals during their inactivity, it’s taken them only 10 days to chase it down and return to their regular haunt of the top four, with the promise of plenty more to come.