Aberdeen’s Leighton Clarkson doesn’t do average goals.
For a player who has barely started filling his scoring account, a frightening proportion of them are ones Aberdeen fans could draw from memory.
His first as a permanent member of the team was no exception – and in the end it would prove to be as important as it was eyecatching.
— Aberdeen FC (@AberdeenFC) August 18, 2023
As Clarkson blasted home, it felt as if he had burst Stirling’s bubble as much as their net. He surely would not have suspected that his strike, by the width of the crossbar, would ultimately prove to be all that separated the sides.
The understatedly impish grin of Clarkson’s goal celebration was exactly the one with which he greeted his late scoreline glosser in Annan at this stage last season.
But this was no tying of loose ends after a mighty struggle. Indeed, it was the critical second which had been missing at Galabank, and whose absence had directly caused the desperate panic into which that evening dissolved.
Not to say it completely smoothed the waters at Forthbank, of course.
Even with that extended cushion, the Dons still managed to make life somewhat stressful, against opponents who brought 10 times more to the fight than when they were routed in the same fixture 13 months ago.
But the second goal did its job, and as Aberdeen now head off to enter Europe – passing regretful Rosenborg and Luzern in the doorway – it provided a further timely reminder forging onwards while holding the advantage is almost always preferable to working from the assumption that enough has already been done.
Barry Robson’s team selection said loudly he did not countenance a further post-Darvel cup catastrophe.
With so little to spare in the final reckoning, he will be very glad of his approach.
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