Stevie Crawford insists Dundee United have no fears about unleashing Salford City target Tony Watt on Rangers.
The striker hit the winner for United last time out at St Johnstone. Since then English League Two side Salford have upped their interest and are expected to see if they can get a deal done after this weekend’s games are done. The Arabs No.2 Crawford reckons it is a good thing that there is interest in United’s players and is adamant they have no concerns about Watt being focused on trying to bring down Michael Beale’s men.
“If Tony wasn’t [focused] he wouldn’t be in the squad,” Crawford said. “One of the attractions about coming here to work with the gaffer is that it’s all about the team. So if Tony wasn’t pulling his weight then he wouldn’t have found himself starting against St Johnstone. He’s working hard on the training pitch like all the players and he took his goal well on Monday.
"He scored the winner for us, it was a very good finish. I don’t know if there is concrete interest in Tony but if there is interest, let’s embrace it. We want people talking about our players.”
The interest in Watt has been sparked as he has seen himself out of the team thanks to the form of Steven Fletcher. Crawford acknowledged Watt has worked hard and is knocking on the door. “You just want your players performing at the best level they can,” the United assistant added.
“Tony took his chance against St Johnstone but, equally, you look at the games before that and Steven Fletcher was a massive influence. He leads the line in a different way. That produces a headache for Foxy right away if we’re playing a 3-4-3.
“Equally, we have gone 3-5-2 at times depending on how Foxy wants to set up. As a player, you just have to be chapping on the door and making sure you’re ready when called on.”
United’s preparations for Sunday’s game have been curtailed by a sickness bug in their squad. Crawford admitted it has impacted a lot of their players but praised gutsy midfielder Craig Sibbald for climbing out of his sick bed and putting in a top-drawer performance at Perth on Monday.
He said: “Sickness is kicking around everywhere at the moment but a few of our boys who have had it came in and trained today.
“Steven Fletcher came back to training. Craig Sibbald had it the night before the St Johnstone game but came out and played through it. Credit to him for that, he is a credit to himself for going for 70 minutes and putting his body on the line.
“It was a fantastic performance from him – hopefully he’s got it for the rest of the season now! Joking aside, that steeliness in the middle of the park is what we needed.”
Crawford has been impressed with the impact Beale has made at Rangers since he came in. They are unbeaten but he knows his United team can’t and won’t go out in fear of them.
He said: “We’ll be respectful and do our homework on what Rangers are good at. But we’ll also work on what has been good from us. There will be different problems that Rangers will cause us – but we can’t be frightened of them. We need to embrace it and try to stamp our authority on them.”
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