Saturday sees the visit of my local team Motherwell to Tannadice and hopefully at last our first home SPL victory of the season. Twice before against Hibs and Kilmarnock we’ve looked as if we were capable of winning a game but have failed to do so and we could yet rue the loss of five points between those two fixtures.
Unfortunately a mini-injury crisis seems to have blown up with several key players being unavailable for this match – to the extent that Owen Coyle may make an appearance on the subs bench!
Most significant amongst the injuries is that to Charlie Miller, who had been scheduled to play his 100th league appearance tomorrow – that now looks like being postponed for some weeks and we may well miss his presence in the midfield, with likely replacement Kerr still struggling, in my opinion, to adjust to the pace of the SPL.
Up front we’ve hardly been firing on all cylinders and it is about time our front men (Jim McIntyre apart) got on the score sheet.
Motherwell have been blowing hot and cold this season so far – an excellent result against Hearts last week will have set them up for this fixture – and by many accounts I’ve heard they should have beaten the SPL’s current third strongest team.
I can’t see any change from a 4-4-2 set up with Scott Paterson still being out of contention but I’m looking for Dodds to be on from the start as I think his experience could tip the balance against a young Motherwell team.
Prediction? Well those who read this regularly know I NEVER get it right but I’ll go for a 3-0 convincing United win tomorrow!