Graeme Shinnie admits Aberdeen knew Livingston would be a battle when the team lines were revealed.
David Martindale started with the giant duo of Kurtis Guthrie and Joel Nouble up front in the opening league game of the season.
It was a tactic that paid dividends for the home side, as they earned a 0-0 draw with the Dons.
And Aberdeen skipper Graeme Shinnie said his side knew they were in for a tough afternoon as soon as the starting line-ups were announced.
He said: “We knew with the physicality they had went with, with the two big guys up front we knew that they weren’t here to try and pass it around.
“Coming to Livingston there’s always going to be that competitiveness in the game, you know that.
“I don’t think it was a dirty game in terms of the amount of yellows. Maybe because it was the first game of the season, it was late tackles more than anything.
“I don’t think it was a feisty game, it wasn’t a dirty game, I think it was lack of sharpness in terms of the late tackles. There wasn’t much in the tackles.
“You know that’s going to be the style of game coming here. It was going to be made very difficult for us but we coped with that very well.
“We got a clean sheet but the frustrating part is maybe not taking one of the chances, because we still had a couple of good chances.
