The presence of Dundee means this should not be a relegation battle but that's beside the point. To be sitting where we are after the first round of fixtures is complete is quite simply not good enough, even if it is only on goal difference, and we can as good as kiss goodbye to the top six already. Improvements need to be made - or it won't be long until questions start being asked of the manager.
However, to do so after this defeat would be unfair. We were better than United in a game that was far from exciting. We were well on top in terms of possession but just couldn't do anything with it, the final ball into the box being particularly woeful an chances being few and far between. United were as bad as I've seen them against us - but they got the goal, and that's what matters. After last week's defending we weren't quite as generous but we did give them a penalty when Steven Thompson handled inside the box. The big man knew straight away it was a spot-kick so at least it wasn't dodgy, but that was little consolation, especially as Craig Samson almost kept it out.
Changes needed to be made after last week's defeat to Celtic and we saw two, David Barron being ditched and being replaced Dougie Imrie. Rather more surprising was the omission of Kenny McLean, the midfielder picking up an injury in training yesterday. That was enough to keep him out of the squad completely, with Jon Robertson the man chosen to replace him. Weirdly we only had six subs, a ridiculous situation I thought we had put behind us. Jack Smith was a sub last week so why wasn't he on the bench today? Pathetic. United kept faith with the side that drew with Aberdeen last week, meaning Jon Daly was in defence and Johnny Russell was up top. Thankfully Rudi Skacel was only on the bench.
It was an unexciting opening - so unexciting in fact the screensaver on my laptop came on as I'd had so little to write about. United were first to meaningfully threaten as Craig Samson gathered Mark Millar's shot after initially spilling it. Thompson was the most likely Buddie to score against his former club but instead it was another former Arab who almost opened the scoring, Lee Mair heading just wide from Dougie Imrie's corner. When a neat passing move from Saints wasn't properly dealt with by the United defence the ball sat up nicely for Jim Goodwin, his half volley dropping a few yards over the bar. And that, aside from a lame shout for a penalty when Robertson seemed to be helped over by Stuart Armstrong, was your lot for the first half. Not a classic - Saints the better team but unable to deliver a decent cross when it mattered.
There was no way United could be so toothless again in the second half and they nearly had the opener five minutes after the break. Willo Flood's free-kick found Gavin Gunning - although there looked to be a blatant foul as he went foor the cross - and he headed the ball off the bar with Samson nowhere. The danger wasn't dealt with and the ball eventually fell for Gunning to have another go but this time he shot wide. Perhaps we shouldn't have been surprised the officials missed that foul considering what we were then treated to. They stopped play when a United player was lying in his own box but not injured, ignored the fact Graham Carey nearly had his shirt pulled off his back and then decided a clear push on Guy as he tried to get on the end of across wasn't a foul. Hmmm.
The second half wasn't a great deal better than the first, Lee Mair livening things up when he went on a Kirk Broadfootesque run up the park that didn't end with a chance - for either side. The officials finally remembered what they were there to do when they booked Millar for wiping out Imrie and United chose that point to hook him and Michael Gardyne, putting on Richie Ryan and that man Skacel. Sure enough a goal almost arrived thanks to the sort of defending we saw from our defence last week. This time it was at the other end as Keith Watson let a cross bounce off him, but Thompson snatched at his shot and it was going wide before Guy at least got enough on it to make Radioslaw Cierzniak in the United goal have to do some work.
It obviously wasn't Thompson's day as a minute later he literally handed United the lead when a Gunning header from a Flood corner hit his arm. Stick on penalty and Johnny Russell stuck it away, although Samson got his hand to it. There was no way we should have been behind, but we hadn't done enough in front of goal to merit the lead. A few minutes after we went behind Guy was replaced by Sam Parkin - an odd move considering Guy hadn't been doing too badly and our crossing was hardly likely to play to the strengths of having two big strikers on the field. It was Parkin's fellow baldy Goodwin who had a go at levelling the scores, but Cierzniak was always going to deal with his left footed strike.
Gary Teale arrived for the final 10 minutes in place of Robertson, the idea perhaps being he could maybe get a better ball into the box than the other crossers we'd been playing. Instead he had a chance to equalise after Thompson laid the ball off for him but his effort was flying wide from the moment he let loose. Our final change came five minutes from time, but it seemed a bit unfair expecting Thomas Reilly to conjure something up when he took Imrie's place. Bizarrely Goodwin was looking our most likely source of an equaliser as his fierce shot was blocked and he fluffed the rebound. There was to be no last gasp heroics this time - we've already had enough of them this season to last another five - meaning the league table makes far from pleasant reading for us.
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