Aberdeen came to Dens Park as leaders of the Development League but suffered only their second defeat of the season as they went down to the Dark Blues.
A young Dons side faced a Dundee line-up that included Willie Dyer, Kevin Thomson, Martin Boyle and Phil Roberts, along with new signing, goalkeeper Arvid Shenk.
The home side appeared to suffer an early blow when Craig Wighton had to go off after only 10 minutes but his replacement, Lee Cameron, didn’t take long to make his mark.
With his first touch his pass split open the Aberdeen defence for Boyle to race in from the right and fire the ball low past Jamie Langfield.
Boyle and Roberts were posing lots of problems for the Dons down the wings as the Dens men dominated the early part of the game and there were 25 minutes on the clock before Shenk had to make his first save of note, easily gathering a shot from Cem Felek.
Lawrence Shankland had the ball in the net five minutes later but the striker was marginally offside.
Langfield then made a superb double save from Boyle and, five minutes before the interval, came to his side’s rescue again, beating away Cammy Kerr’s cross-cum-shot.
Aberdeen equalised just seconds after the break when Cammy Smith put Lawrence Shankland through and his low shot beat Shenk in the Dundee goal.
Ten minutes later, the Dons were reduced to 10 men when Michael Rose was shown a second yellow card for bringing down Josh Skelly as the striker bore down on goal.
Cameron took the penalty kick and sent Langfield the wrong way from the spot.
Ryan Lamond then replaced Thomson in the Dundee midfield.
Skelly and Cameron were giving the rejigged Aberdeen back line some difficult moments and both had good chances to extend the home side’s lead and it was only good goalkeeping by former Dundee keeper Langfield that kept the score close.
Max Avolio came on for Roberts and 10 minutes from time came the goal of the game, Cameron hitting a 25-yard screamer that crashed off the post and into the corner of the net.
With virtually the last kick of the game the Dons grabbed a goal back when Marcus Campanile scored with a 20-yard drive.
FT: Dundee 3 Aberdeen 2
Dundee: Shenk, A Black, Kerr, Allan, Dyer, Thomson (Lamond 55), Roberts (Avolio 78), Colquhoun, Skelly, Wighton (Cameron 10), Boyle.
Subs not used: Gourlay, Moncrieff, Gallacher, Cunningham.
Aberdeen: Langfield, Robertson, Harvie, Gibbons, McKenna, Rose, Felek (Norris 80), Campanile, Shankland (Jones 55), Smith (Ross), Wright.
Subs not used: Billington, Petrie, Kelly, Orsi.
Report: Jim Davie
