Peter Leven praises ‘brilliant’ wingers after Aberdeen hit Livingston for six

Aberdeen are bearing the fruits of being given ‘the freedom to play’ after hitting Premiership struggler Livingston for six.

The Dons ran out 6-2 winners in an eight-goal thriller at Pittodrie on Saturday that moves them up to seventh and five points off a place in the top-half.

Interim boss Peter Leven was delighted with the performance and was impressed by the impact of his wide players in particular.

Livi, who remain rooted to the bottom of the table, were 2-1 up towards the end of the first-half before two injury goals handed the home side a 3-2 lead at the break.

Manager David Martindale, who was shown a red card, says the referee never had control of the game but admits his players must take individual responsibility.

The Dons showed remarkable resilience to turn the game around having opened the scoring through Kenan Bilalovic before quickfire goals from Mahamadou Susoho and Robbie Muirhead had Livi in front.

Kevin Nisbet netted near-identical goals in first-half added time to put the Dons back in front.

Martindale was sent to the stands and was quickly followed by striker Jeremy Bokila and Aberdeen centre-half Jack Milne, who were red-carded after an off-the-ball clash.

Aberdeen immediately netted a fourth goal through Sivert Heltne Nilsen and winger Topi Keskinen added two more solo efforts to cap the performance.

Leven said: “The conditions were difficult, but I thought we started really well with some great combination play and some good goals and yet again our Achilles heel [set-pieces] cost us.

“We’ve worked on mentality in the last couple of weeks – there’s good footballers in there and you saw that today.

“Both wingers were brilliant – they were wide and direct which is what Kevin [Nisbet] needs and I thought Mitchel Frame was brilliant as well.

“The intensity has gone up. I demand a lot from them but I also give them the freedom to play and express themselves and I think you saw that today with some of the goals we scored and Kevin’s chopped off goal as well.”

Martindale was quick to take accountability for his red card, but called on his players to take individual responsibility after a poor defensive display.

He commented: “It’s important I take responsibility for that, but I thought the referee never had control of the game.

“That’s not the reason we lost the game, but it is the reason I get sent off. There’s a clear and obvious foul we didn’t get and I reacted to that.

“Me getting sent off didn’t help the group so I have to take accountability for that.

“We lost our structure after that. The game was so open at 10 v 10 and we had to make substitutions we wouldn’t have made in normal circumstances.

“Defensively we were all over the place.

“We manage to get ourselves back in it at 2-1 and lose a poor second goal from a wide area, a poor third goal from a wide area with individuals not doing their jobs properly which is disappointing, but I still think we had enough to get something from the game.”