Tony Docherty insists Dundee are good enough for the Premiership – and he’s been hammering home that message to his players.
The Dark Blues have taken one point from their first two games back in the top tier, drawing 1-1 on opening day against Motherwell at Dens and then losing 2-1 to St Mirren in Paisley on Saturday.
Dundee have fallen behind in both of those matches with Docherty urging his players to start taking games by the scruff of the neck early on.
And the manager admits it is also part of his job to instil belief in a squad that contains several playing in the Premiership for the first time.
Docherty said: “Yes, we always do that on a Monday when we analyse the game.
“That’s exactly what we have done again, just instilling that belief, to say they are good enough.
“They need to believe they are good enough, to be on the front foot and not wait to have a look at the opposition to go on the front foot.
“We have to go on the front foot first and that’s something we will be doing this week again, trying to instil that into the players to ensure we carry more belief going into games.”
Dundee had a chance to equalise at 1-0 against St Mirren but Zach Robinson’s penalty was saved with the Dark Blues also passing up other opportunities.
Now, Docherty is urging his players to be more clinical when those chances arise.
The 52-year-old added: “I think you need to give credit to St Mirren, they were very good in the first half.
“I thought that when we got to grips with it with the change of shape, we then became the dominant team in the game.
“But we then got ourselves opportunities to go and capitalise and we never took them.
“That is something we need to learn from – game to game that when opportunities present themselves, you need to be clinical in this league.
“Yes, we probably needed to start the game better but once we got a foothold in the second half and even in the first half with the missed penalty opportunity, we needed to take these chances.”
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