How to turn bad news to your advantage

So unremarkable and unproductive was his fleeting Pittodrie career, Michael O'Neill's input to Aberdeen's weekend was very probably the most significant contribution he has ever made to the club.

The stressed Northern Ireland manager's ill-fated decision to press Niall McGinn into action in Luxembourg was understandable but unwise, and its inevitable backfiring did not go down well in Aberdeen.

With the team already desperately struggling for the goals to prevent a promising season from stalling, losing its one genuine threat to a dead qualification rubber was not helpful.

But McGinn's absence provided the opening for Cammy Smith to make his first start of the campaign. His sparky shift proved that, after a frustratingly and puzzlingly idle August, he is too good to ignore any longer.

Indeed the home-grown midfield three of Smith, Ryan Jack and Peter Pawlett – none an enforcer by repute – completely dominated a placid Partick with their pressing, aggression and anticipation.

It was a masterclass in that most modern of concepts of changing the terms of reference by what the team does without possession.

It was Smith who eked out the game's decisive moment, thwarting Sean Welsh's misjudged goalline shepherding to shear him of the ball, then playing Gabriel Piccolo like a penny whistle to shovel it to an abandoned Calvin Zola. Within seconds a ball which seemed to be trundling nowhere was bulging the Thistle net for a second time.

Though this alone was no game on which to judge the Dons' striplings – Partick were painfully soft, and a shambles at the back – space must be made, even when older heads are restored, for Smith.

Pawlett too. His confidence slowly rising for having been trusted, for the first time in his Dons career, to play the full match three times in a row.

It is men like these who will define Aberdeen's future, on the field, in the community and in the wider consciousness.

My ball: Aberdeen's Cammy Smith challenges Sean Welsh, right, for posession