The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
McKinnon keen to avoid red cards before play-offs
Boss stays positive despite bans for Murray and Edjenguele
SUSPENSIONS BLOW:
There is also the considerable silver lining of both men being able to serve their suspensions before the play-offs commence, with United still hoping to finish second ahead of Falkirk and thereby wait until the semi-final first leg on the 17th.
Manager Ray McKinnon was certainly keen to look on the bright side.
He said: “We knew if William got booked he would miss the two games but I guess, if you are looking for a positive, this will mean he is available for the play-offs.
“We will miss him because has been getting back to his best form for us.
“William has hardly missed a minute for us but this two-week break might just be good for him and he will come back with a real spring in his step.
“Simon is another one who has been walking the tightrope and he got a booking on Saturday as well, which will rule him out of the Morton game.
“I suppose I am looking on the bright side as you would prefer to have everyone available but those two should come back fresh for our first play-off match, whenever it is.”
With McKinnon desperate to have as many options as possible for the play-offs, he was keen to stress the importance of avoiding red cards over the next couple of weeks.
He said: “Now we must ensure that no one gets any silly sendings-off over the last two games against Dumbarton and Morton. The message to the players is that discipline is very important because we will need to have as many people available to us for the play-offs as we can.
“You need as strong and as full a squad as possible because we all know the play-offs are notoriously difficult to get through.”
With that in mind, McKinnon has been treading carefully with his players’ health and wellbeing.
He added: “It is a wee bit of a balancing act. You need to manage it and, for example, Lewis Toshney had an infected toe so we decided to leave him out on Saturday because we need everyone to be spot-on.
“We also have Tony Andreu doing light, light training, while we are keeping players like Willo Flood ticking over in training.”
A bonus to come out of the victory over St Mirren was the half of action given to new boy Wato Kuate. Despite being caught out a couple of times and making one or two mistakes, McKinnon was happy with his overall contribution.
The United manager said: “You need to trust your players and, let’s be honest, he has played for Galatasaray so knows what it’s about. But I hadn’t seen him at our level so it was a big call to put him in there.
“I thought it was now or never to have a look at the lad in a game because, again, we want everyone ready for the play-offs.
“I thought he did well even though he was desperate to impress and gave the ball away a couple of times.
“He knows that you have to be quick with the ball at your feet in this league but I am glad to have seen that he can handle it. His upper body strength is excellent and, even though he still needs to learn, it gives me another option for what lies ahead.”
Kuate came on for the injured Scott Allardice, with McKinnon revealing that the 19-year-old was struggling from early on in the game.
McKinnon said: “Scott hurt his knee in the first 10 minutes and we can’t take any chances with him, given that he has done it twice before. He has had a couple of bad knee injuries so it was the right thing to do in replacing him at half-time.
“Hopefully, it is not a bad one and he was in at the club on Sunday for a check and was feeling better. “We will keep an eye on him.” Meanwhile, McKinnon had praise for the United supporters, who formed the vast majority of the excellent 6,225 crowd that watched them beat the Buddies with Blair Spittal’s last-gasp goal.
He said: “We now look forward to facing Dumbarton here on Saturday and our home form has been phenomenal.
“The players like playing out there and I note that we had another great crowd on Saturday so credit to the fans for getting right behind us – we all appreciate it.”
Dundee United striker Simon Murray will miss the club’s final game of the regular season against Morton through suspension.
The in-form frontman was booked in the 3-2 Tannadice thriller against St Mirren so will join central defender William Edjenguele on the banned list.
However, while Edjenguele will sit out both this weekend’s home clash with Dumbarton and the trip to Cappielow on May 6, Murray will be free to face the Sons on Saturday before sitting in the stand in Greenock.