Paul Paton: Big-money Dundee United signings '˜didn't deliver'

Dundee United's Paul Paton is facing up to relegation. Picture: Craig Williamson/SNS

Paton feels the players only have themselves to blame for their relegation after Mixu Paatelainen followed Jackie McNamara in being sacked. And he defended chairman Stephen Thompson, despite being told he is free to find another club.

In a frank interview on the club’s own online platform, Paton claimed big-money signings had failed to deliver. When asked what had gone wrong, he told Arabzone: “Where do you start? To lose two managers their job is the lowest of the low. I have never felt so bad in a season.

“When Jackie and his staff went I was obviously bitterly disappointed – they brought me here. Mixu’s made me captain and he’s lost his job.

“I do feel we have let two management staff down, a group of fans who have stayed loyal, we have let them down, and more importantly, we have let ourselves down.

“People are quick to blame the chairman but people forget he’s reinvested a lot of money into this team. There’s boys in there on big wages. There’s boys we paid hundreds of thousands of pounds for, that have come in and maybe looking at it, it wasn’t great business for the club.

“You look at a team like Aberdeen bringing in boys like Kenny McLean, Hibs with John McGinn. We paid more for our players and, if you’re being honest, they have just not delivered.”