First-leg goal hero Blair Spittal knows Dundee United’s home record makes them hot favourites to complete play-off quarter-final success over Morton at Tannadice tonight.
But the attacker stresses if the Tangerines think their 2-1 first-leg success in Greenock on Tuesday means it’s a case of job done, they will come unstuck.
Spittal got the winner at Cappielow as United turned in a commanding second-half display to bounce back from going a goal down.
Delighted as he was with the result, he knows a tough 90 minutes could be in order for the second game.
That’s why he’ll ignore stats that show only Celtic are a tougher nut to crack on their own patch than Ray McKinnon’s team.
“There is no way we are thinking that’s us through. We’ve got a great home record but, the minute we start thinking the tie is over, that’s when we let Morton back in.
“We can’t become complacent. Morton will come out and have a go at us and we have to be aware of that and be ready for it.
“If we are and we’re on it, that can play into our hands. We can use the space they need to attack us and get at them.”
And, if United were on fire as they roared back in that second period on Tuesday, Spittal is determined to use the memory of a poor first 45 minutes to remind everyone they cannot afford to take things easy tonight.
“We know what happened in the first half and that can’t happen again,” he added.
“It was terrible. We got a bit of a kick up the backside from the gaffer at half-time and rightly so because we weren’t putting enough pressure on them.
“I thought in the second half we did that very well. We were closing them down and playing much more of the game in their half.
“As well as the goals, we created a few chances and played a lot of good football.
“To be honest, though, I don’t think we could have got much worse than the first half.
“There were no excuses for it and, like I say, the gaffer was right to have a go at us for it.”
Despite his caution, there is no question that if United can reproduce their second-half display, they will have a good chance of not just winning handsomely in the second leg but of going all the way in the play-offs.
While his focus is only on tonight, Spittal can’t disagree with that statement.
“If we play like we did in the second half, we would be confident we’d have a chance against anyone.
“It’s about belief and that was missing for a while. Not in the last few weeks because, although we haven’t won as many games as we should, the performances have been good.
“Now we’ve turned that into a good win and we want to keep that going.”
The 21-year-old also won’t mind if the scoring form he’s hit in recent weeks continues throughout the play-offs.
It took him until last month’s home win over St Mirren to grab his first of the season but Tuesday made it three goals in four games. He admits that’s been a relief.
“Throughout the season I’ve had good chances and not been putting them away. That’s been frustrating but I’ve kept my head down, kept working and now the chances have started going in.
“Hopefully, I can build on that because we’ve a massive game coming up now.”
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