WE have finally reached the point in the football season when we begin asking which team will be second in the Premiership title race in the next campaign.
Assuming, as most people will, that Celtic's greater financial clout and all that goes with it will again mark them down as champions-elect, the focus will once more be on a clutch of sides, including Hearts - though their exploits in the top tier are unlikely to be as fruitful as they've been in romping to the Championship title - as potential occupiers of the silver medal place on the podium.
Derek McInnes made the point after his Aberdeen side's defeat to Dundee United that in finishing runners-up this season, the Dons have been much closer in points to the Hoops than anyone thought possible.
Indeed, the Pittodrie outfit's form, driven by an incredible energy and a high-level of fitness, has been outstanding; their defence has been stoic and with Adam Rooney leading their line, their strike-rate hugely impressive.
McInnes has assembled not only a squad worthy of honours but one which believes almost evangelically in their leader's vision as they regurgitate his teachings as religiously as those nice elders from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints who knock on your door from time to time.
But that is no bad thing. Football managers, as much as anyone, need the men they lead to buy-in to his thought process. Dissenters at Pittodrie, one feels, will be ditched.
Which is why players like Shay Logan, rightly named by his peers a the best right-back in the Premiership, are upbeat about the future and even after Robbie Muirhead's stunning early strike gave United a win they deserved overall, the former Brentford defender offered his thoughts on his team's aspirations while taking a swipe at the comments of Kris Commons, the Celtic midfielder, that the Hoops never felt threatened by Aberdeen.
"I can't predict the future," Logan said, "but Celtic are not the side of previous years. They are a very good team still and despite what has happened between me and them in the past [the racist allegations against Aleksander Tonev last December] I have a lot of respect for them and fair play to them for winning the league.
"But they are not invincible. The games we have played have been very close and we don't fear playing anyone in this league, especially at Pittodrie.
"It is disrespectful of Kris Commons to say there has been no title race. It's all well and good saying that when he needed us to lose a game but he wasn't saying that two months ago and wasn't saying that when his team played us."
Logan and his team-mates will have the chance to redress the balance when Celtic visit Pittodrie next Sunday when the hosts will not wish them to celebrate a win nor their title success on northeast soil.
However, the Reds will need to be better than they were against a feisty Dundee United whose punchy performance belied their dramatic loss of form in recent times and in which John Souttar - his 40-yard defence-splitting pass paved the way for Muirhead's winner - and Nadir Ciftci were exceptional. Could they, as has been speculated, find themselves among Ronney Deila's Parkhead personnel next term?
Charlie Telfer, now settled into the midfield in Jackie McNamara's young team - four of the starters and two substitutes who played were under 21 - is an admirer of Souttar, himself just 18.
He said: "John is a pleasure to play with. He is so comfortable on the ball and you could see from the pass for the goal that he is brilliant.
"That boy could play anywhere. He has a great touch and vision. He is strong and quick.
"He played in that holding position in pre-season and he was brilliant so I am not surprised he has come in and been absolutely fantastic.
"He had a bad injury at the start of the season so it is good for him to be back, to kick on and do what he is good at.
"It means more competition in midfield but to play alongside him is fantastic."
The Arabs sit just four points below third-placed Inverness Caledonian Thistle and the game between them in the Highlands tomorrow night is therefore an appealing proposition for the former Rangers starlet, who hopes that Muirhead, whose goal was his first for the Tangerines since his arrival from Kilmarnock in January, can reproduce a similar strike against the Scottish Cup finalists.
"I have been impressed with Robbie since he arrived here," he said. "He is a big boy and can hold it up well. He is a good asset for the team."
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