Labour of love coach Eastie

Determined to repay the faith Raith showed in him, he rebuffed the chance of a quick move but when United came calling he admits his affection for the place where his career started made it an offer he couldn’t refuse.

“I enjoyed Raith, there were good people, a good club and it was tough to leave but I couldn’t turn this job down.

“This is a big responsibility because United have produced some great players over the years. There’s a lot of good players come through and a lot of good people looked after the kids here, so there’s a lot to live up to. I was lucky to work with a lot of those people.”

In recent years, the conveyor belt of young talent at Tannadice has slowed but Craig’s confident, along with assistant Scott Robertson, talent will flow.

That’s in no small part because the mechanism required to produce players is still in place.

“We know how important it is to keep bringing players through at this football club and there is talent here.

“There is so much that goes on before us to get it to the stage where we take the players. It’s not about us, it’s about everything that goes before that to get them to the point where Scott and I take them.

“Brian Grant (academy head) is on top of that and making it better all the time. It’s about us then doing the extra wee bit to take them to the first team.”

came through as a young player.