Alex Neil has admitted that last season's success in a back three has given him "food for thought", although a lack of striking options made it difficult to switch tactics during the Dundee United game.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
"A four for me is more natural in terms of how my teams have generally played. However, certainly going to a back three, although I wouldn't say it was forced on us, gave us a better balance at times. What it has given me is a bit of food for thought."
TEMPTED TO SWITCH
"It's certainly not something I would discount now, it's something I could definitely turn to. I was actually tempted to go to a 3-5-2 at the end there [at Dundee United] just to sample it out, so there may well be one game between now and the start of the season where we try that out."
LACKING DEPTH
"But, unfortunately, at the moment we are a little bit short of striking options, because for that to work you need two centre-forwards. Hopefully that will get resolved over the next little bit and we can try that out."
TEAM SELECTION
“That team that I picked today does not have any bearing on what the first team of the season will be. What is was five lads, six including Patto (Anthony Patterson) played 90 minutes in the last game and that’s now nine lads that have played 90 minutes in this game."
MINUTES ARE KEY
“The rest of the lads will certainly play 90 minutes on Tuesday so that will be everybody ticked off 90 minutes and then we’re going to have three games left between now and the start of the season which is good. We can top each of them up in terms of what they need for minutes. Come the start of the season, broadly, they really should be pretty much equal or as close to that as we can.”
