Jesse Curran insists Dundee will “scrap” for every point as they battle to save themselves from relegation.
The midweek defeat at St Johnstone left the bottom-placed Dark Blues two points behind St Mirren and six adrift of Hamilton Accies with only half-a-dozen matches remaining.
Jim McIntyre’s men had opportunities against Saints but it was still a pretty comfortable 2-0 win for the hosts at McDiarmid Park.
Aberdeen are the next visitors to Dens on Saturday, while down in Lanarkshire the other two under-threat teams will go head-to-head.
Therefore, if they take nothing off the Dons then Dundee will lose more ground on one or both of their drop rivals.
It is a precarious position to be in and they appear to lack confidence but Curran is trying his best to be upbeat.
Asked if he thought the players were up for a battle, he replied: “Yes – definitely. We need to be.
“We have to work hard and stick up for each other.
“We must all scrap for each other.
“We are still confident we can get out of this.
“We are just focused on ourselves and I’m sure that if we do that the other results will take care of themselves.
“It is 100% doable.
“I would say even Hamilton are still in it. We haven’t given up on that either.
“We have to give everything in every game from now until the end of the season but the boys know that.
“We have to get through this.
“Now it’s about seeing if you have what it takes to be a footballer, really.
“It’s about whether you have the bottle to get out of this situation.”
Curran sent over a superb cross that should have been converted by Ethan Robson just two minutes into the second half on Wednesday.
That would have made it game on at 1-1 but instead St Johnstone went on to grab the next goal and close out the match.
Curran said: “I would agree that it would have made all the difference (had Robson scored) but it is the fact we are creating those opportunities that will help get us move up the table and out of the relegation scrap.
“I think the performance against St Johnstone was good. We played some good stuff and had our chances.
“We didn’t take them in the final third and that’s why we lost the game.
“I think we were unlucky. We had a few chances when they were 1-0 up and it was a real sucker-punch when they went down the park and scored again
“We still had more opportunities to get back into the game after that and I don’t feel we were fazed by being behind.
“We kept playing our football and it was all about not taking those chances.
“I think if we just keep doing the right things it will fall for us.
“We have to keep playing away and not go back to long ball stuff. We have to stay structured.”
