WITH apologies to Motherwell who were excellent in this thoroughly deserved win, let us begin with just how bad Aberdeen were.

Once the home side took the lead, next Sunday's League Cup finalists played like a pub league team who had been out on the skite the night before.

Stephen Robinson, the Motherwell manager, was quite spiky after the match for some reason, as he suggested that nobody would write about how well his team had played.

Well, that's wrong but before we get to that...

Aberdeen were embarrassing

At 3-0 down, Andrew Considine was defending a Motherwell attack. The ball was between the defender and his goalkeeper Joe Lewis. Neither knew what they were going do themselves, never mind what was going through the other's head.

Considine eventually put the ball back, Lewis took a swing and conceded a corner, much to the home support's amusement.

Then late on, substitute Scott Wright beat three men in a good run and then stubbed his foot as he went to take a shot.

And then there were the goals they conceded.

Aberdeen had a corner and within ten seconds Motherwell took the lead.

Motherwell were allowed two headers for the second - which gave Danny Johnson a double - and the defending for Danny Turnball's goal was, to borrow a word from Derek McInnes - calamitous.

Short corners should be outlawed

Aberdeen kept trying some supposedly planned move from their corner kicks. Why?

Get the ball into the box. That's what the set-piece was invented for.

Aberdeen are not the biggest side but their own fans actually booed when their team didn't put a cross in.

Ask yourself this. Have you ever seen a good short corner?

James Wilson did not look interested at all

The Manchester United player probably didn't plan on being in Scottish football but he's here for a reason.

And that's to help Aberdeen and his own career. It's not to sulk.

At 22, this is a great chance for him to score a few goals which would set him up for when he does head back down south.

To be brutally honest, his performance in this game was a disgrace.

Wilson was hooked at half-time but his body language suggested he would rather not have started at all.

There are plenty of examples of players doing well in loan spell in Scotland and that has helped them when they returned to their parent club.

If Wilson thinks he's too good for Scottish football, he is very wrong.

It will be interesting to see if he makes the team to face Celtic.

Motherwell have enough to stay fourth bottom at worst

This was their best performance of this season by some distance.

With Adam Campbell superb in midfield, and Christian Mbulu enjoying an outstanding debut, they were well worth their 3-0 win.

Guys such as Richard Tait are invaluable to a club like Motherwell. He gives everything in every game, never stops running and has a bit of skill about him as well.

Gael Bigirimana can go from being very good to, well, not very good in a matter of minutes, but he gets about the park and is always looking for the ball.

Robinson might believe his team don't get enough recognition - I would humbly disagree - but more performances like this will some pleasing headlines.

Mark Gillespie is a good stand-in for Trevor Carson

He was brought to Motherwell to be the No1 and then Carson's move to Celtic fell through.

Gillespie looks the part. He made a couple of good saves, one from Lewis Ferguson late on was superb, and he also took out Sam Cosgrove, a big unit, when coming for a cross.

However, let's hope Carson recover quickly from what sounds a serious case of deep vein thrombosis.

"The medical staff at Northern Ireland, here and at the hospital have been fantastic for Trevor," said Robinson.

"He is on the right medication, I’m not an expert, but we want to make sure he is okay health-wise and then we will see what happens after that. Mark didn’t surprise me at all. He has had to be patient but his attitude to the game, training and waiting his chance has been rewarded. He showed the qualities he has.”