Dundee bounced back from their midweek League Cup humiliation with a stunning 1-0 win against Hearts at Tynecastle on Sunday.
A third-minute Ryan Conroy penalty gave Barry Smith’s injury-hit team their first SPL goal and win, taking them off the bottom of the table and denying their opponents top spot.
It was the perfect response to their defeat at Third Division Queen’s Park, and the Dark Blues boss feels this should now give his players the belief that they can survive in the top flight.
He said: ”I felt we had started all our games well and put teams under pressure, but this was the first time it’s worked for us.
”I’m absolutely delighted for the boys because they’ve given exactly the same effort as that every week. But it’s great for them to get their rewards this time.
”We’ll not be kidded on by one result. We know it will be a long, hard season but we should take a lot of confidence from winning at a really difficult ground like Tynecastle, where Hearts aren’t often beaten.
”Hopefully we can be consistent now, and if we perform like that we’ll give ourselves a great chance. It’s always great getting a victory going into the international weekend.”
As well as scoring a first-half penalty, Dundee also conceded one, but Rab Douglas saved from John Sutton.
Smith was happy to praise his 40-year-old keeper but wanted to stress that this wasn’t the Rab Douglas show.
He pointed out: ”Robert was brilliant today. To be honest he produces performances like that all the time and I don’t want to single him out because I feel that was a great team performance from all my players, who gave every ounce of effort.
”He’s made the penalty save to keep us ahead and another couple of brilliant stops after that. But we defended really well as a team and that started from the front and worked its way back.
”We tried to make things a bit more compact and make ourselves difficult to break down because I felt we were conceding goals a little bit too easily.”
Hearts manager John McGlynn didn’t put the defeat down to a post-Anfield hangover for his team.
He commented: ”Dundee have been struggling to score and it seemed like a penalty kick was the only way they were going to score. It gave them a massive lift and us missing our penalty gave them another massive lift.
”We gave a lot of effort and put plenty of crosses into the box but we lacked composure and creativity in the final third of the pitch.”For a full match report, see Monday’s Courier