| A weekend of misery, that saw Dundee only draw with Inverness Caley Thistle on Saturday and United lose at home to Dunfermline, means the relegation dogfight will be battled out between the city clubs and Livingston in five days time.
Both clubs can still beat the drop via their own efforts, but the Dark Blues, in particular, have a mountain to climb.
Without a win away from their home city for an entire year, they must beat fellow-strugglers Livingston in West Lothian to leapfrog to safety.
The Tangerines still need the point it looked like they were getting until a Mark Kerr own goal handed the Pars the victory they needed — only a bizarre set of results can now relegate Jim Leishman’s team and they can now be discounted from the equation — just two minutes from the end at Tannadice.
United will have to travel to their final league game at Inverness without influential defender Paul Ritchie.
Ritchie was carried off near the end yesterday with a serious groin injury and he will, unfortunately, also miss the Scottish Cup Final against Celtic on May 28.
“Obviously, I’d have hoped to have a player of his experience available, but we have David McCracken to come in, and he can handle the situation,” said interim boss Gordon Chisholm.
Disappointed as he was to lose a game his team dominated for long spells, Gordon believes his players will still get to safety.
“Now it’s a case of being strong mentally and physically and going and doing the job. We are very disappointed, but we always said we were prepared to go all the way to the last day of the league to get to safety, and that’s what we are having to do.”
He was quick to absolve Kerr of any blame for a goal he felt Dunfermline never looked like scoring.
“I would not attach any blame to any of the players. We’ve missed a couple of chances because their goalkeeper has made brilliant saves and their goal was a ball Mark had to go for — that it ended up in our net was one of those freakish things that happen when you are down where we are.
“There is no point in looking back, though, and now all we will be thinking about is going to Inverness to get a result.”
In the Dundee camp, too, there was defiance that they can upset the form book and win away for the first time since the derby win at Tannadice back in August. A success would also be the first ever at Livi.
“We are not thinking in terms of our record, only doing what we have to and winning at Livingston. I see no reason why we cannot do that,” said midfielder Neil Barrett.
“Saturday against Inverness was a disappointment, because we know we should have won, but there is still confidence among the players that we are good enough for the SPL and we can show that this week.”
There was one city club celebrating at the weekend as Lochee United clinched the East Super League title after twice coming from behind to beat Bo’ness 3-2 at Thomson Park.
The win sets the Bluebells up nicely for the OVD Scottish Junior Cup Final in a fortnight’s time, when they take on Tayport at Tannadice Park. |
