Dundee United are to bank a £540,000 windfall thanks to former player Stuart Armstrong.
The Scotland midfielder is off to the bright lights of the English Premier League after Celtic agreed a £7 million fee with Southampton.
When the Tangerines sold Armstrong to the Hoops in the final hours of the 2015 January transfer window in a double deal involving Gary Mackay-Steven, his part of the cash pot is understood to have been £1.6 million.
United included a sell-on clause that entitles them to 10% of the difference between what Saints are paying now and what the Parkhead club bought him for, with the £540,000 coming United’s way calculated as a tenth of the £5.4 million gap between the two fees.
It was the sale of Armstrong and, to a lesser extent, Mackay-Steven to Celtic that many Tangerines fans saw as the start of United’s decline, a fall that has resulted in a third successive season in the Championship.
It is ironic, then, that Armstrong’s decision to join Liverpool star Andy Robertson – a former United teammate of his – in the English top flight is responsible for providing the Tannadice side with a much-needed funding boost for their forthcoming promotion campaign.
