Aberdeen: Derek McInnes at most ‘dangerous point’ of seven-year spell

Their view predates the current malaise, but one win in seven has done nothing to ease the tension between the fans and the club. The Dons have dropped to fourth place in the Premiership with Livingston, in fifth, eating up ground on them with every passing week. The hubbub at Celtic has dominated the headlines, but there’s a lot going on at Aberdeen, too.

It’s not just the supporters that McInnes needs to concern himself with now, though. This latest run appears to have brought the board to the brink. Or, at least, enough of the board.

It would take a seven-figure sum to compensate the manager and assistant manager if the worst materialises at Easter Road on Saturday but there is an acceptance at the top that either the situation improves now or a change needs to be made, however painful in a financial sense and in a human sense.

McInnes has done a fine job, but there is a growing feeling that he’s just been there too long.

This is all a far cry from the early days of McInnes’ time at Pittodrie, when previous chairman Stewart Milne brought him in and backed him to the hilt, with good results. McInnes took over a failing club and immediately turned things around.

In the four seasons before he was appointed manager, Aberdeen finished ninth on three occasions and then eighth with a win percentage that sunk to 25% at its lowest point and only rose to 36% at its highest.

Eighth place became third in his first full season, which became second in each of the four seasons that followed. In 2014, Aberdeen won the League Cup. Around that point, if not earlier, Milne started to look on McInnes as a man who was capable of walking on water. His successor, Dave Cormack, isn’t quite as transfixed.

In February 2016, with Rangers and Hibs both still in the Championship, Aberdeen beat Ronny Deila’s Celtic to move within three points of the league leaders with 14 games to go, but then fell away dreadfully, losing seven of those 14. A case of what-might-have-been that will live with all Dons fans from here until eternity.

Much of it was promising, though. Six straight cracks at European football, regular visits to Hampden for cup semi-finals and finals, the pick of them being the terrific 2017 Scottish Cup final when McInnes’ team went toe-to-toe with Brendan Rodgers’ invincibles and only lost to a late, late Tom Rogic winner.

That Aberdeen side was formidable, but it broke up soon enough. Graeme Shinnie, Ryan Jack, Kenny McLean and Jonny Hayes were all lured away and while Aberdeen finished a strong second once again in the season that followed, by dint of a first win at Celtic Park in 14 years, things deteriorated slowly after that.

Their business in the transfer market became borderline hapless. Reams of players have been signed in recent seasons and the success rate has been low. In 2018-19, Steve Clarke’s Kilmarnock finished third with the Dons fourth, their win percentage across all competitions dropping from 64% to 55% and then to 50%.