Dundee derby ‘chaos’ excites Dens Park striker Simon Murray

Dundee skipper Simon Murray is looking forward to the “chaos” of the Tayside derby on Sunday.

The 33-year-old striker has played for both sides in the fixture, having had a spell at Tannadice before the first of his two spells in dark blue.

And ahead of the first William Hill Premiership meeting between the two sides this season, Murray said: “It’s a great honour.

“I’ll look back on my career one day, probably, and think, playing in the Dundee derby for both teams – and I have done it – it’s a great achievement and obviously to be captain of the club and to be leading the boys out on Sunday is something that I’m really proud of.

“I love these games, both sets of fans are bringing everything to the game and it’s 90 minutes normally of a sort of chaos, but I like that, I love it.

“And hopefully I’ve got another game that I could look back on with fond memories.

“When you’re going into the game, the atmosphere is building, from the morning to the kick-off, and obviously the warm up and everything else.

“When you’re in that dressing room, you just need to focus on what we work on, on the training pitch when it’s calm and find that on the match day.

“Obviously there’s going to be moments in the game where it’s a bit frantic in the atmosphere, but when you sort of get over that and bring a real calmness then, hopefully that’s what we can do and do what we’ve been working on.”

United’s Luca Stephenson, who returned for a second loan spell from Liverpool, played in three Tayside derbies last season, coming up on top only once.

The 24-year-old said: “Derby days are always exciting. Everyone around the country gets up for them, and it’s no different here.

“It’s a huge game. When I came back up, the first fixture I looked for was the derby – it’s come around quickly, which I was buzzing about.

“These games bring out an extra 10–20 percent in you because it means so much to the club and the fans.

“I remember losing last year and how horrible that felt for us and the supporters.

“But when you win a derby, it’s the best feeling in football – you feel invincible. Hopefully, this is the moment we use to kickstart the season.”