Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
United boss: We need to be brave
RAY McKinnon insists his players have to come through the run they’re on by passing the ball — and there’s nowhere better to start than at a cup final.
The 2-1 defeat at Raith Rovers on Saturday was Dundee United’s third in a row and not the kind of preparation they’d like for a cup final this coming weekend.
The Tangerines take on St Mirren on Saturday at Fir Park aiming to lift the Challenge Cup for the first time in the club’s history.
And McKinnon is looking forward to it.
He said: “I can’t wait for it, it’s a great opportunity for us to win a cup that everybody was in this year from three different countries.
“Hopefully, we can do that and then kick on until the end of the season, I think that’s important.
“But we need to get that ball down and start passing like we used to do at the start of the season.
“That’s the message to the players right now, we’ve got to come through this and make sure we do that because t hat’s how we want to play football.
“We need to, as a team, be braver and start getting that ball down and start passing it because we don’t want to get embroiled in fights and scraps.
“We need to keep moving that ball. We need to get people like Tony Andreu in the right areas and get the ball moving.”
Tickets for Saturday’s final at Fir Park (ko 12.30pm) are £20 for adults, £10 for concessions (U/19s and O/65s) and £5 for U/12s.