Relaxed probably isn’t the right word to described Billy King’s frame of mind when Dundee United were suffering some early-season teething problems a while back.
But one thing the wide-man certainly wasn’t doing was panicking.
Without being arrogant about it, he admits the quality of the squad at Tannadice was too high for things not to come good.
And that’s why he’s not surprised the Tangerines are heading for Livingston today just a point off the pace at the top of the Championship and looking to extend their unbeaten run in all competitions to what would be an impressive seven games.
“We brought in a lot of new players over the summer, myself included, and things did not click right away,” said the former Hearts man.
“But when I looked around the dressing-room and saw some of the players in there, I knew we would.
“There were too many good players for us not to click.”
United now have and, as well as the individual talent in Ray McKinnon’s squad, King’s confidence has been further boosted by the nature of recent wins over Morton and high-flying Dunfermline.
“We have players who individually can produce things that will win games but, as a unit, I thought we looked good.
“Going down to Dunfermline in the last league game, we knew it would be a hard one because they were top and were the high scorers in the division.
“We knew we would have to defend well and I thought we went there and did that.
“We also played some really good football on the counter-attack and controlled the game well.
“We were two up by half-time and, when you do that against a team who’ve been playing well, it gives you a lot of confidence.”
Ideally that East End Park success just under a fortnight ago would have seen another league encounter follow quickly.
The international break meant that wasn’t to be but he believes last weekend’s victory for a young team over Linfield in the Irn-Bru Cup was another positive.
“It was another win and we are now on a good run.
“That builds confidence as well and, when you are on a run like this, it means it’s a good place to come to your work each day.”
King stresses hard graft has also played a big part in getting the season up and running and he knows plenty more will be needed if three points are to be taken from what looks a tricky trip to West Lothian.
After coming up from League One, hosts Livi have been in impressive form. Just one defeat so far has put them in fourth spot, just two points short of United.
And three wins and a draw in September saw the Almondvale side perform marginally better than the Tannadice men and earn manager David Hopkin the second tier’s Manager of the Month award this week.
That means it looks certain to be a hard-fought 90 minutes and King is expecting exactly that.
He, though, believes United have what it takes to make it three big wins on the bounce.
“It’s not going to be easy because Livingston have been going well and I think they’ve lost just once through there.
“After our recent wins, we’re feeling confident and I think we have a right to be.
“We’ll be going there looking to get another three points and we’re capable of getting them.”
This article originally appeared on the Evening Telegraph website. For more information, read about our new combined website.