Teetotal Csaba Laszlo hasn’t touched a drop of alcohol since he was a young man on military service.
But if the Dundee United manager can get his team’s season back on track and guide them into the Premiership, he can see himself being drunk for a week!
And, despite falling 11 points behind Championship leaders St Mirren, Laszlo is still aiming to kick off promotion celebrations on the back of a title triumph.
“My target hasn’t changed,” he said. “It is to move up the table. You have to have that target.
“The plan A is still to challenge St Mirren. It will be difficult, I accept that.
“I respect the players and the manager there. Even if we win every game we know they still have an advantage. Everything is not in our hands.
“We have difficult games but so do St Mirren. Livingston, Dunfermline, Queen of the South, Inverness and others are all dangerous opponents. They have to play them too.
“I have told my staff that I was drunk twice in my life. Both times it was during my military service. I thought ‘never again’ because I was so ill – once for three days and once for a week.
“But if we reach our target this season I will be five days drunk!”
Laszlo has admitted that wounds from previous seasons cut deep at United, which doesn’t make achieving his goal any easier.
“It is a big club with big fan potential but a lot of disappointment,” he said.
“In the last three years from the chairman to the players to the fans – everyone got a slap in the face.
“This doesn’t go away easily.
“First year the club was relegated. The next year the club lost to Hamilton to go up – very hard again. This is the third year and we are in the same situation trying to go up and we are not leading the league. It hurts everybody.
“Everybody is asking ‘who has made the mistakes?’
“It can go back to the managers, the board and the chairman. They are the easiest to point at. But I say to everyone who supports Dundee United, this doesn’t help anybody.
“We are trying to avoid the mistakes of the past. Together we can achieve something.
“We are working hard to put everything right and I say to everybody who wants us to do well – if your friend is down, give the hand and try to bring him back up. Don’t kick him.”
Laszlo believes the long-term injuries to Scott Fraser and Fraser Fyvie have boosted their promotion rivals as well as weakened themselves.
“If teams like St Mirren and Dunfermline had the choice which two our players they wanted out from Dundee United, they will say Fraser Fyvie and Scott Fraser,” he explained.
“I lost the brain and the heart of my team.
“But I don’t hide behind this. I have to rebuild. We have dropped our quality but we will come back. I’m sure of it.”
