After a scrappy opening 15 minutes in which the hosts created two openings, it was the visitors that almost broke the surprising apathy with a fabulous run from Danny Invincible.
Taking the ball wide on the right, he skilfully outflanked three defenders before being outmuscled by Lee Wilkie as he pulled the trigger a few yards out. This was closely followed by a Craig Bryson volley from the edge of the box that flew narrowly past.
It took 28 minutes until we saw the first save and it came from Lukasz Zaluska as Bryson powered a 25 yard piledriver which the Pole was forced to punch to safety.
And as the Tangerines continued to be and sixes and sevens, Invincible almost found the net with an acute angled shot.
But there was controversy in the 38th minute when Jim Jefferies and Billy Brown were justifiably angered when Killie were wrongly denied a penalty.
There was some super work around the box by David Fernandez who fed Gavin Skelton. As he ran across the box he was tripped by James Wesolowski but the referee waved away the appeals.
After a dreadful opening half, United began the second slightly more inspired with Paul Caddis' 52nd-minute shot forcing the first diving save from Alan Combe.
A deep 60th-minute ball from Paul Dixon then found Wilkie ghosting in with a header that was narrowly missed by the on-rushing Francisco Sandaza.
Mehidi Taouil's 83rd-minute volley was the best effort for Killie. However, there was little more to excite the fans except for Paul Dixon's red card in the 87th minute for bringing down Invicibile when he was the last man.
But it was a surprise that both sets of fans stayed to the end as this was one to easily forget.