James McPake backs Dundee to bounce back against St Mirren

James McPake has backed his Dundee players to bounce back from Wednesday night’s 5-0 thrashing at home to Ross County.

The Taysiders travel to Paisley to take on St Mirren on Saturday still stinging from a home humiliation against the cinch Premiership bottom side who won their first league game of the season to go one point behind the Dark Blues.

The result was all the more surprising given that Dundee had beaten Aberdeen and drawn with Hearts in their previous two matches with what looked like pivotal results, but McPake believes his dressing room has the character to respond to the setback.

He said: “It wasn’t good enough. We let the club and the fans down.

“But the comfort we do take is that we have had situations before we have been on our knees and we have got back up and come back fighting and that is what we are going to do. They are a good group.

“I can understand why the fans would be frustrated, after watching that.

“They have seen poor performances before and this group bounce back before.

“(They have) seen this group come up through the play-offs when everyone was writing us off as well so there is enough experience and character in that dressing room to turn this result around and get our season up and running again.

“We have a massive game and if we feel sorry for ourselves then the same thing will happen in Paisley so we need to go there in a positive frame of mind, put in a positive performance and get a good result.”

McPake senses a hunger from his players to make amends for the midweek mauling but expects a tough match against a side who drew 2-2 at Dens Park on the opening day of the league season.

He said: “They are hurting, they were down as well, Wednesday night, Thursday morning – but they have responded very well.

“Whether it has been in a tactical meeting or on the pitch, they have responded well and you can sense that, you can feel that they are desperate to put it right.

“They are going there tomorrow to come off the pitch hopefully having made the fan base proud of them again because Wednesday night was nowhere near the standards.

“St Mirren are a good side, we faced them here in the first day of the season and it was a good game.

“I have seen it a couple of times. I watched them at Motherwell and thought they were excellent at Fir Park on Wednesday night.

“But we have to find a way to cause them problems.”