Dundee boss Neil McCann insists his players should fully embrace their favourite’s tag to approach tomorrow’s derby with a swagger – and he doesn’t care if United use that message as motivation.
As a player, the 42-year-old experienced derbies in the City of Discovery with the Dark Blues, in Edinburgh with Hearts and in Glasgow with Rangers.
Tomorrow will, of course, be the first time he has managed in one but he was certainly not holding back with his comments, throwing down the gauntlet to his players – and the opposition.
He said: “I don’t think it (being favourites) brings any pressure. If the boys are worried about being favourites because they are the Premiership side, then I don’t think they are in the right place.
“They should embrace it. They should be walking out there with a swagger.
“Dundee United might use these words to motivate them and fire them up – I don’t really care.
“They know themselves they are the Championship side. They will want to come here and put one over on us.
“There is nothing wrong with being confident. As long as you are not disrespectful to the opposition team or fans or players then there is nothing wrong with being confident going into a match.”
McCann may have lit the blue touch paper as far as the United half of the city will be concerned but he insists that while it is important his team play with passion, they also have to keep cool heads in the white-hot atmosphere at Dens.
He added: “In derbies, people sometimes end up getting involved in the occasion but we’ve had a bite-sized build-up because of the Cowdenbeath game.
“We really concentrated on that. So it has been a shortened look going into Dundee United. “Obviously it will be exciting for the new guys coming into the ground and all the build-up that goes with it. But I will be saying it is about concentrating on ourselves.
“There are old sayings like what Alex McLeish used to say: ‘Fire in the belly, ice in the head’. I like that, it is a good saying.
“You want them fired up and up to the maximum but make sure you make cool decisions. For instance, don’t panic when the ball is in or around your box.
“Have a cool head to make sure you make cool decisions and you are not slashing at it. It is a pretty good saying for derby football.”
McCann admitted that although he played in different derbies, he is fully aware of exactly what each means to everyone connected with a club.
He added: “They all have the same importance to the people of the city and the clubs.
“There are obviously different levels of intensity for different derbies. The Glasgow one stands alone for obvious reasons.
“But I am not ignorant about what it means to the actual clubs, especially being so close. It adds a bit of spice to this one.
“We are obviously the Premiership side playing against a Championship one. I want us to go out with that mind-set that we are clearly the favourites. I don’t want them to be frightened of that and I don’t think they are frightened of that.
“I am glad we walked away with the full three points from Cowdenbeath, which gives us a clear chance of topping the group which is what we wanted to do.
“We know Dundee United, we know their threats. Billy King wide, Paul McMullan comes in off the side, I like Scott Fraser as a footballer, I think Sam Stanton is a really good player and Scott McDonald has signed. We know their threats.
“We will absolutely respect them as a side. But the flip side of that is that we know how good we are.”
Dundee have received a boost with Faissal El Bakhtaoui fit to play although there is a doubt over Danny Williams after he landed awkwardly on his shoulder in training.
