Dundee United midfielder Blair Spittal feels the club have learned the hard way that they need to match opponents physically first and foremost as they seek to improve on their record against St Johnstone.
United have only won two out of their last 15 meetings with their Tayside rivals and have often been outmuscled by the Perth team, but Spittal feels that will not be a problem on Saturday.
Dave Bowman revealed opponents viewed them as a “soft touch” during his spell as caretaker boss in September but manager Mixu Paatelainen has sought to remedy that.
And Spittal said: “It’s a physical league and you need to be ready for it. At the start of the season it took us quite a lot of games to realise that: it wasn’t all about playing the football we wanted to play.
“It was all about rolling the sleeves up and getting into the battle, and then playing the football you want to play.
“That’s what we realise now, it’s sometimes about winning ugly. With the position we are in, we have to be able to do that.”
Despite their improvement, United remain seven points adrift at the foot of the Ladbrokes Premiership and Spittal knows they will have to fight their way out of the predicament, starting at McDiarmid Park.
The 20-year-old added: “It’s going to be a battle and we have got to overcome the battle before we earn the right to play.
“We have shown in recent weeks we are ready for that. We are starting to take points and win games that we wouldn’t have at the beginning of the season.
“You look at the games against Hearts and Ross County, they are physical teams as well and we overcame that physical battle to take the three points. We will certainly be ready for it.”
United’s shift in emphasis is apparent from statistics. They received 16 yellow cards in their first 10 Premiership games, before Paatelainen took over, but have collected 18 in their most recent five encounters.
And the Finn is confident his team can match St Johnstone’s approach.
Paatelainen said: “We do realise that St Johnstone are dangerous. They have a style of play which is not always pretty but very effective.
“They are really good at that and we must be on our toes because they can really hurt us.”
But he added: “I think we have plenty of physicality in our team, whoever plays. Our players were branded soft touches earlier in the season but I don’t think our players are branded that at all at the moment.
“I think we more than match our opponents with physicality, everything within the rules.
“We are aggressive and can also create chances and score goals. Recently we have scored a lot of goals.”