Aberdeen's malaise: 'Everyone at the club needs to do better - there's frustration, anger'

Unsurprisingly, Joe Lewis was as downbeat as we’ve seen him when entering the press room at Pittodrie in the wake of Aberdeen’s 1-0 defeat by Ross County.

Joe Lewis is beaten by Joseph Hungbo's penalty as Aberdeen lost to Ross County.

Condemned to bottom-six football for the first time since 2013, Aberdeen are in a perilous position. They sit sixth points clear of 11th place and while it would take an almighty collapse to fall into the relegation play-off position, the Dons have only won once in the league since Boxing Day. That is the form of a team flirting with the drop.

Had Aberdeen beaten the Staggies, they would have forced their way into the top six. As it is, they were booed off the pitch, with some fans singing “you’re not fit to wear the shirt”. Lewis knows the Dons have fallen way short of expectations.

"We had ended up having 45 minutes to salvage something from the season and try to finish on a positive, but the second half wasn't good enough and it epitomised what has happened previously,” said Lewis. “Every time we feel like we've got an important game or an important moment, we've not delivered. There is enormous disappointment in the dressing-room right now.

"There's now five games left. We have got a free weekend and we have to train hard and try to get this out of our system. It's a really sore one. There's frustration, anger.

There’s anger in the stands, too. Aberdeen fans are not used to this. Asked what the team can do to win them over, Lewis responded: "Results, at the end of the day. Seventh place is the best we can get now and that's not good enough for Aberdeen, that's for sure. There's a lot of hard work to be done going forward. We understand their frustration. They're not alone in feeling that, but the only way to change that is through results.”

Lewis can’t put his finger on the malaise. "It's very hard to say,” he added. “I think the effort was there. It's easy to say that we've worked hard but that's not good enough when you are wearing an Aberdeen shirt. The quality needs to be there throughout. I'm not going to point the finger at anyone but everyone at the club needs to do better, and that's what we will work on."