Dundee boss Steven Pressley had Yan Dhanda penalty faith despite training miss

Steven Pressley insisted he had complete faith in Yan Dhanda taking Dundee’s penalty against Falkirk – even though the player had missed one in training on Friday.

The on-loan Hearts man scored the only goal of the game for the Dark Blues in first-half stoppage time from the penalty spot as they won 1-0.

Dundee were reduced to 10 men late on when sub Simon Murray received a straight red card.

However, the hosts held on to secure what could be a priceless three points with Dundee now three points ahead of Kilmarnock and seven ahead of rock-bottom Livingston.

Dens boss Pressley said: “On Friday in small-sided games there was a penalty given and Yan stepped up and missed. Jon McCracken saved it.

“But I’ll be honest with you, I had real confidence in him. He’s a precision passer, and he’s a cool customer.

“Overall, I thought he was terrific.

“I thought he was a player that, through all the commotion and the frantic nature of the game, always seemed to find that time and space.

“And of course, he had the composure to put the all-important penalty away.

“I think Callum Jones was trying to get on it, because he scored against Livingston but Yan was the man.”

Dundee now have another crunch clash against Kilmarnock at Dens on Tuesday night and Pressley is under no illusions about the importance of the game.

He added: “It’s really big. We’ve not really had a moment in the season where we look like we’re getting momentum.

“We’ve had a sporadic win, and then we haven’t managed to follow that up.

“Tuesday is another of those moments where we actually could gain a little bit of momentum at a really important time, so we can’t pass that up.

“We’ve now got to shift our attention to Kilmarnock.

“Tomorrow we’ll be in training, and we have to make sure that we show a similar type of determination on Tuesday.”

Falkirk boss John McGlynn admitted he had no complaints about the decision to award a penalty against his side.

The manager said: “It was a penalty kick. There’s no doubt the ball hit his hand.

“He’s trying to block a shot and trying to turn.

“If he’s made his body bigger, I suppose by the letter of the law it’s a penalty.

“Some you’re going to get, some you’re not going to get.

“It’s a bit of a lottery but that’s all that separated us.

“We didn’t have enough quality to get a goal back.

“You’ve got to grind it out and get a point out of it.

“We have to keep working away and try to find an end product.”