Stand in skipper David Hannah called for calm over United league position, arguing that at this stage of the campaign time still favours the Tangerines to stay up. And certainly St Mirren and Aberdeen could, granted a swift upturn in United’s fortunes, be caught and overhauled. But, a veteran of United’s last exit from the top flight, Hannah knows points are required and quickly if they are to avoid having to rely on Falkirk winning the First Division title to stay up.

"There’s no need for panic, not when we’ve 23 games left to play," he observed, "If with 10 games to go we are still in this predicament then we’ll be panicking but not now, especially when there has been encouraging signs in the past three weeks. "At the times Dundee got their goals I felt that we were on top. But you cannot legislate for the kind of mistake we made for the first one and have been making all too often. "There’s no doubt we have got to cut out these sort of mistakes. But at the same time we are going to keep struggling until we start putting the ball in the net.

Beto Naveda has done extremely well for us over the past couple of games but he needs someone else to play alongside him, a proven goalscorer, and I am sure the manager will address that situation." Cameroon under-21 cap Mvondo Atangana, who partnered the Argentinian against Dundee, has speed to burn-but until he develops an understanding of the offside rule (he was pulled up six times in the opening 20 minutes on Saturday) he’ll be as much hindrance as help to Naveda. Boss Smith believes his recent signings Jim Lauchlan, Charlie Millar, Jamie Fullarton and Naveda will prove very worthwhile acquistions and on the limited evidence available he’s probably right.

But for now United are trapped in a downward spiral, lacking the confidence required to win and having what self belief they retain eroded by this desperate run. ©The Courier