By Andrew Argo

A BOYCOTT by around 3000 Dundee fans of yesterday’s thrilling 2-2 draw with city rivals Dundee United at Tannadice cost United an estimated £50,000, Tangerines chairman Eddie Thompson said last night.

He felt sure that his team’s supporters would reciprocate by boycotting Dens Park the next time the two teams meet at that venue, not—he stressed—that he was proposing such action.

Dundee fans stayed away in an unofficial protest at circumstances surrounding their closure-threatened club’s plan to rent Tannadice for home games next season.

That will not now happen as Dundee’s administrators confirmed last week that the team will play on at Dens, but the episode left a sour taste in the mouths of Dark Blue fans.

Fears arose that they would stay away in large numbers from yesterday’s derby match, despite pleas from Dundee manager Jim Duffy and administrator Tom Burton to turn up to give their team backing.

Dundee chief executive Peter Marr, interviewed on television before the match, said Dundee fans should be at Tannadice to cheer on their heroes.

Dundee sold only 2100 of the 5500 tickets allocated to their fans, and the match was watched by a total crowd of 9571.

The attendance at the previous meeting on the same ground in October last year was 12,767. Yesterday’s game was screened live on television but so was the October game, ruling out live broadcasting as a reason for the reduced turn out.

The Easter holiday weekend may have had an effect, but Eddie Thompson was in no doubt about the main factor.

“There was definitely a boycott,” he stated, “and it has cost Dundee United about £50,000 because of it. That was money we had budgeted to come in, but it is one of those things.

“One of our problems will now be to stop our own fans from doing the same thing the next time we play at Dens Park. I am sure there will be reciprocation. I think it is an absolute certainty, although I am not calling for our fans to do that.”

It was the idea of Dundee’s administrators and main creditors Halifax Bank of Scotland, who are owed nearly £14 million, that they should seek to groundshare Tannadice next season as one of three options.

The United chairman continued, “All we were doing is what we were asked to do, which was to help our city neighbours and a fellow SPL club, and this was agreed by the SPL.

“Now we find ourselves £50,000 worse off—well, that is football.”

Large areas of the two sections of Tannadice reserved for away fans, the Shed End and the Jerry Kerr/Fair Play Stand, had swathes of empty seats. Mr Thompson said if he had known in advance how few seats Dundee fans would take up, United would have kept the Shed end for United fans, “because we could have sold more seats.”

The Dundee supporters’ organisation Dee4Life said prior to the match that, having gauged fans’ opinion, they decided not to call an organised boycott but would leave it for supporters to make up their own minds about attending the game.

A special screening of the game at Fat Sam’s nightclub, which opened specially for the occasion, and at other pubs and clubs across the city were well attended, however, suggesting that many had made a conscious decision to stay away from Tannadice.

George Knight, chairman of Dee4Life, was asked last night if he had been at Tannadice.

He challenged the relevance of the question and eventually said, “No comment.”

Mr Knight went on to say that Dundee supporters had been irritated by comments made by Mr Thompson and some prominent Dundee United supporters in the ground-sharing debate.

He explained, “They said that we lacked class and were not true supporters.

“There were probably numerous factors that contributed to so many people not going, but a lot of people did go.”