Star man Tony Andreu faces a battle to be in the Dundee United line-up for Friday’s top-of-the-Championship clash at Hibs.
Joint top scorer with nine goals in 16 games, the Frenchman missed Saturday’s defeat at Dumbarton.
Gaffer Ray McKinnon revealed that was due to a rib injury that means this week United will face a tense wait to see if he is OK for Easter Road.
“Tony has a rib injury. He has pulled a muscle high up, so there was no point pushing him to play at Dumbarton but he wanted to go on the bench.
“Now he has had a chance to recover and recharge the batteries. I would think he has a chance for the Hibs match — I certainly hope so!”
Ray, meanwhile, could not hide his disappointment at the end of the team’s 14-game unbeaten run.
In dreadful conditions, his side lost for a second time this term at the Sons and, again, home full-back Mark Docherty got the only goal, a cross that was caught by the wind and ended up in the United net.
“I was really disappointed. It was a strange, freakish goal, everyone has missed it with the wind and it’s found its way into the net.
“It was a frustrating day. I’m not making excuses but that was horrific weather to ask players to play football in.
“But we take that one on the chin and move on.”
Ray admitted he felt several of his players failed to reach the levels of recent times and the 90 minutes were another example of why he’d like to add another striker to his ranks.
“I think there was three, four, five of them below par and who were not up to their usual level. There was a bit of a lack of quality.
“It wasn’t until we put Mark Durnan up there we looked a bit of a goal threat, so that’s disappointing when your centre-half becomes your biggest goal threat.
“But we’ve had a great run, three months unbeaten.
“Sometimes football is like that and you have to accept it, move on and try to make sure it’s better next time.”
United sold out their allocation of tickets for Saturday’s game and are close to doing the same for Friday night’s big clash with Hibs at Easter Road.
That game is being shown on BBC Alba.
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