DUNDEE United manager Craig Levein is in a quandary over how to manage Spanish striker Francisco Sandaza's introduction to Scottish football.
The ex-Valencia player wowed the Tannadice fans in pre-season, scoring three times after coming off the bench, and has already hinted at possessing the skills to help United mount a serious challenge for third place in the Clydesdale Bank Premier Lea
gue.
However, Sandaza's fitness levels are causing his manager concern because he did not complete a pre-season programme due to the way his season in Spain ended, leaving a window of only a few weeks between completing the campaign and moving to Scotland.
The 23-year-old impressed against Hamilton when he came on as a late substitute on Monday but his lack of stamina meant his fitness took a knock, even though he only played for 22 minutes. That has left Levein pondering whether to sacrifice him for the time being in order to build up full fitness, but he is also aware of how valuable the forward can be even only half-fit.
"Fran's muscles do not have the endurance in them, the same as the rest of the players do at this stage, so I probably should leave him out for a few weeks so he can do a pre-season," Levein said. "But when you see his ability, that's much easier said than done because he's got the ability to change games. But, no matter what, I've got to be careful to not use him for too long because he's liable to suffer little niggles so he definitely isn't ready to start."
Levein has demanded improvement from his team following Monday's defeat and defender Danny Grainger is confident the team will get back on form against Celtic tomorrow.
Grainger revealed it has been a long week for the Tannadice players, who have been desperate to get back out on the pitch to atone for their mistakes at New Douglas Park, and the left-back predicts an improvement of up to 75 per cent on that performance.
He said: "We don't really care who we're playing – all we want to do is get back out on the pitch and try to make up for Monday night. We just want to put the memory of the Hamilton game behind us as quickly as we can.
"The biggest thing is that we know we probably couldn't play any worse than we did. I reckon we could be as much as 75 per cent better this weekend, that shows how bad we were on Monday, but also tells you how much scope we have for improvement.
"We're at home this week and that's a good thing because we've made it difficult for teams at Tannadice in the past. Everyone who travels here knows they are in for a game – that was the case last season and we've got to make sure it's the same this time round.
"Since I came here, if we've had a bad result, we've always bounced back. That's what the lads aim to do, we've got to show our resilience."
The full article contains 528 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
