Dundee United manager Jackie McNamara could be forgiven for starting the week with a sigh after yet another of his young stars was linked with a switch away from Tannadice.
Far from it, though, as the boss is just delighted to see his players hitting the headlines for all the right reasons.
Following speculation surrounding the futures of Ryan Gauld and John Souttar last week, left-back Andy Robertson has become the latest player to be on the radar of a top club, with Liverpool said to be monitoring the 19-year-old’s progress closely.
Robertson, who only joined from Queen’s Park on an initial two-year deal in the summer, put pen to paper last week on an extended contract that should tie him to Tannadice until May 2016, although Courier Sport understands that Anfield boss Brendan Rodgers is still keen on taking the teenager to Merseyside in the January transfer window.
But faced with another Monday morning of having to answer questions about his young players potentially being lured away by big money moves elsewhere, McNamara is looking on the positives.
“As I’ve said before, I don’t see it as a bad thing,” he said. “You saw the way the boys handled it at the weekend Souttar with all the speculation was immense, Gauld was great, Andrew was consistent yet again. So long may it continue.
“I think everybody looks at the downside of it and it’s like: ‘How long can you keep these guys?’ But the important thing is that they are playing well and doing the business on the park.
“If they are doing it at a consistent level every week then they are going to be linked with other clubs. For me that’s the pleasing thing that they are doing it on the park and it’s not just speculation off it.”
Scouts from Liverpool have watched Robertson in action and it is thought a bid could well be tabled in the new year, although the contract extension agreed last week means Liverpool would have to fork out a significant sum to land the left-back.
But that is unlikely to put Rodgers off. McNamara has been delighted with the way Robertson has settled in at United and is not surprised to hear clubs have made him a transfer target.
“The first day he came in for pre-season I think he expected to be in the young players’ dressing room and he went through with the youngsters and realised he was in the wrong dressing room.
“Since then he’s been excellent. His temperament is first class,” he added.
McNamara plans on watching Robertson and Stuart Armstrong in action for Scotland Under 21s against Slovakia at St Mirren Park on Thursday, while Gauld and Souttar are away with Scotland Under 19s this week with Aidan Connolly and Darren Petrie.
The United boss was in buoyant mood after his side’s 1-0 win over Kilmarnock at the weekend, and he was relieved to capture maximum points.
“You see so many times in games like Saturday you have so much of the game, you have so many chances and you are dominant, but because it’s still 1-0 the other team are still in the game.
“It would have been nice to get the second goal and we had chances to do that, but it would have been a sore one if we hadn’t taken all three points.”