St Johnstone 1-5 Dundee United: Saints’ hoodoo going strong

By ARCHIE MACGREGOR
Published on Sunday 12 February 2012 02:33

FOR some reason St Johnstone tend to have bad days at the office when Dundee United come a-calling, but on this occasion it turned into a disaster.

They may have enjoyed a decent season to date but the Perth club have to go back to November 2000 since they last recorded a league win over their Tayside neighbours and this rout now takes their sequence of SPL matches without a victory against them to 15.

As if those bare statistics aren’t galling enough, the comedy of errors that contributed to Saints’ downfall must have been particularly disheartening – there were two own goals, from Steven Anderson and Callum Davidson – and let’s just say that Peter Enckleman provided potential footage for those compiling goalkeeping gaffes.

A contented United manager Peter Houston, fresh from last week’s Scottish Cup triumph at Ibrox, probably didn’t bring too much relief to the sore heads around the home dressing room by asserting “the scoreline flattered us – we’ve played better. Only after they pulled a goal back did I think we showed our quality. The deliveries into the box by Paul Dixon in particular were outstanding”.

Curiously, in the light of the final outcome and their post-Ibrox high, United made a fairly indifferent start to this game. Saints enjoyed a decent spell of early possession but their good ideas moving forward were generally extinguished long before they reached the United penalty area, although Davidson did threaten to turn back the clock by over a decade though by surging forward and sending in a shot that skipped narrowly wide.

The all-important breakthrough was to arrive at the other end of the park, however, and from the home side’s perspective it was something of a defensive car crash. Dixon’s floated free kick from 35 yards out looked only mildly threatening, but Enckelman misjudged an attempted intervention and flapped it on to the back of Anderson from where it proceeded to trundle into the net. In the circumstances it seemed a tad harsh that Anderson was credited with the own goal, considering his erratic team-mate’s culpability.

The goal arrived just as United were starting to assert themselves but even after that their advantage up to the break was not entirely convincing as they survived two penalty claims – one from a stumbling Lee Croft which was rightly dismissed by referee Iain Brines, and another where Liam Craig was knocked aside by Gavin Gunning, which was more contentious.

Houston might have been inclined to tweak his side despite them getting their noses in front, but his hand was forced in any case as Garry Kenneth hobbled off before the interval to be replaced by Sean Dillon. However, it was more than the United personnel that appeared to have been revised when they emerged for the second half.

Gary MacKay-Steven was now on full throttle as he started to toy mercilessly with his opponents down the left flank. Further goals seemed inevitable and it was a measure of the discomfort in the home ranks that the next one that came along again saw a Saints player turn the ball into his own net, this time Davidson bundling the young winger’s low cross past Enckelman.

There was a morsel of comfort for Anderson and the hosts as, amidst the maelstrom, they somehow cut the deficit, with the Saints defender turning in a Liam Craig free kick from close range to give the scoreline a respectable look. It only stirred the visitors to respond with a fearsome late goal burst as the roof well and truly caved in on the Perth men.

Dixon’s ability to deliver tempting crosses was the catalyst for two more from the visitors, with well-placed headers from Johnny Russell and Jon Daly sealing the victory. There was still time though for United’s recent Slovakian recruit, Milos Lacny, to capitalise on another head-in-hands mix-up between Dave Mackay and poor old Enckleman to roll in a fifth as full time approached.

“You’ve just got to take it sometimes,” lamented Saints manager Steve Lomas afterwards “and I’ve certainly got the chin for it”.

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