A FIRST Tannadice sell-out in years; a media circus that would dwarf Barnum's and a Barcelona team boasting individuals worth more than Dundee United lock, stock and barrel.

Thursday's pre-season visit of the Catalan side has all the trappings of the two fabled European ties contested by the clubs. It simply cannot possess any of the real finery adorning the teams' UEFA Cup quarter-final of 1987, or the second-round Fairs Cities confrontation 21 years earlier. Neither will it impact on the competitive record between the pair that, after these match-ups, for United reads played four, won four.

"It is an unbelievable statistic for a club like United when you think of their size compared to Barcelona, but any team would think it pretty unbelievable to have that success over one of the greatest teams in the world," says Jim McInally. The Morton manager was an integral member of the United midfield for the home and away victories over Barca in March 1987; victories that, because of their context in paving the way to reach the final and as a result of being more contemporary, are regarded as more momentous than those secured by United in October 1966.

Yet, each ousting of the Catalan side by the Tannadice club is equally remarkable in its own way. United were on their first excursion in European competition when a first-round bye brought them a trip to the home of the Fairs Cup holders - and a side who had annexed the trophy no fewer than three times in the previous eight years.

In contrast, McInally was among few relative European newcomers when Jim McLean's side took to the Nou Camp pitch for the return leg of a UEFA Cup tie on March 18, 1987. The footage of the encounter posted in YouTube homes in on the player, signed from Coventry City the previous summer, as he emerges from the underground tunnel. He looks about as white as his peroxide locks.

"At the time I had never played in a game quite like that, while all the other boys were used to these sort of occasions," McInally says. United might have been little fancied to prevail that evening, despite taking a 1-0 lead into the return. But with the core of team - David Narey, Paul Sturrock, Paul Hegarty and John Holt - having played in the European Cup semi-final three years earlier and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1982 and 1983, they had become Britain's most experienced team. The ban on English clubs following Heysel made sure of that.

"We were 100% set-up by wee Jim to play in Europe with a studied approach and quick forwards, and had this mentality about us that we were never over-awed regardless of who we played," McInally remembers.

Rewind 21 years and the backdrop was entirely different. None of Jerry Kerr's players, apart from Swedish internationalists Lennart Wing and Orjan Persson, had ever played in Spain before they headed to the Nou Camp for their first-leg tie. That they earned an early lead through Billy Hainey and doubled that when a penalty won by the same player was converted by Finn Seemann made their debut on a most unforgiving stage all the more astonishing. Despite a domestically struggling Barca - watched only by a cat-calling 20,000 crowd - pulling a goal back through Fuste, United had little difficulty closing out an extraordinary success in the home return. Facing up to roughhouse tactics The Scotsman described as "mayhem of the MacBeth variety", United secured a 2-0 win in front of a record 28,000 Tannadice crowd, with Hainey again on target and Dennis Gillespie netting the other.

The ease of victory sets it apart from United's 1987 triumph. McLean's men may not have been the rank outsiders of their predecessors. But it seemed to count decisively against them that they were drawn at home first against a Catalan club then managed by Terry Venables. Even though United had European pedigree and had accounted for Lens and Hajduk Split in earlier rounds, they found themselves up against opponents who had recently lavished huge sums on new players. Venables, indeed, parted with no less than £6m to combine Gary Lineker and Mark Hughes as an all-British strikeforce.

Despite Barca leading La Liga when they travelled to Tayside and having only lost the European Cup final on penalties to Steaua Bucharest, Venables had found himself under pressure for introducing a reductive, scuffing style to a team whose supporters demanded flamboyance. Indeed, the tie turned on the efforts of strikers, both present and past. First to make an impression was young Kevin Gallacher. He fired United in front at Tannadice when he found the target from an impossible angle on the right flank with only 108 seconds on the clock. Fittingly, the effort had strong echoes with Hainey's strike all those years earlier.

Venables bemoaned the loss of a "fluke" goal and McInally believes it was one of the breaks that allowed United to take a 1-0 advantage into the return. "Kevin will tell you he meant that goal and we still laugh and joke about it but the truth is it was a cross," McInally says. "But we defended well and never looked under a great deal of pressure. We were fortunate, though, that Lineker missed a pinch late on, though we were worth our lead."

It was earned through a teasing and tormenting display from Sturrock, whose nimble, ceaseless movement constantly forced the visitors on to the back foot. As he could do no wrong, Hughes could do no right. "Over the course of that tie, I actually felt sorry for Mark," McInally remembers. "Absolutely nothing was coming off for him and all his strengths became weaknesses. He was only in his early 20s and clearly struggling to cope with the resistance he met with from the Barca fans. At the return leg in the Nou Camp, he was a broken man."

United, too, were expected to be broken men when, on the stroke of half-time in that encounter, a Hegarty clearance from a corner rebounded into Caldere's path. He accepted the gift and netted with a shot from inside the box that beat Billy Thomson thanks to a deflection. "That was a huge blow," McInally recalls. "But we knew we were having a lot of good possession and it was a big thing for us that they didn't have Carrasco running the midfield. He was superb at Tannadice but picked up a booking and so was suspended for the second leg. That made a real difference in terms of the space we had to play in."

It was space that Sturrock exploited when he took the ball for a stroll down the left flank and won a foul with five minutes remaining. McInally sensed it could provide United with their moment. "We were always dangerous from set-pieces because we worked on them so much and because, in John Clark, we had a central back who had been converted from a centre-forward," he says.

As Ian Redford flipped the free-kick into an inviting area in the box, battering-ram Clark used his old striker's knowledge to power a header past Zubizarreta, via the underside of the bar. The tie was then over for Barca but not over for United, who preserved their 100% winning record over the Catalans when McInally released Sturrock on the left and he crossed for Iain Ferguson to pick his spot with a low header.

McLean declared the win "the greatest achievement in our history". Yet, McInally believes it was eclipsed by the 2-0 win over Borussia Moenchengladbach in the next away date of their UEFA Cup run - a result that set-up a final against IFK Gothenburg and the first appearance by a Scottish club in what was then a two-legged decider. "We didn't have a lead to protect after a scorless first leg so to have to win in Germany to make it through a semi-final and do that so convincingly was some going," he insists. The soul-destroying failure that followed against the Swedes, who entered the second leg of the final 1-0 up and deflated a tumultuous Tannadice by scoring an away goal only 22 minutes into an encounter eventually drawn 1-1, had repercussions for McInally which he still curses. The midfielder's commanding performances for United in Europe earned him a call-up to the Scotland squad for the Rous Cup. England at Wembley the weekend following the UEFA Cup final and then Brazil at Hampden the next midweek was the competition's seductive schedule.

"I was so drained by what happened against Gothenburg, I couldn't muster any enthusiasm for the Scotland games," he recalls. "Because the final had only been two days earlier, we weren't picked for England. But even by the time Brazil came round my head was still mushed by how our UEFA run had ended. I couldn't believe it. Every boy grows up dreaming of playing for their country against Brazil and when I was actually able to do that, I wasn't up for it. I knew in my mind the only chance for me and United to win a European honour had gone and that really cut me up."

The United side of 1987 broke new ground in Europe just as they were approaching break-up point. In the 20 years since Gothenburg, the Tayside club have never even successfully negotiated two rounds in any European competition. They have never again drawn Barcelona, mind you.

Hainey's mixed feelings over Dundee United's first Euro adventure
WORKING in a Glasgow jewellers is how 68-year-old Billy Hainey fills his time these days. And the former Dundee United striker doesn't feel the need to buff up the anecdotal gems he was left with through proving the cutting device that shattered Barcelona in the second round of the 1966-67 Fairs Cities Cup.

In October 1966, Hainey became United's first scorer in Europe when he stunned a soulless Nou Camp to send United on the way to a barely credible 2-1 victory in their first outing in the continental domain. For good measure, he followed this up by winning the penalty that allowed United to ease to a 4-1 aggregate success, courtesy of a 2-0 success in the Tannadice return leg. He scored then too. A goal that prompted a record 28,000 crowd in the Tayside ground to riff on "McEwan's is the best buy" advertising jingle and serenade Hainey as "the best buy".

"They weren't slow in changing their tune, though," says Hainey, who was only three years with United, scoring nine times in 44 games for them before moving to St Mirren, then Portadown. Among his net-bulging moments were goals in wins over both halves of the Old Firm but no strikes were sweeter than those against the Catalans.

"I suppose those games were the pinnacle of my career, but I don't dwell on them," he says. "I rarely meet people who bring them up and I certainly don't think back that often. I remember playing well at the Nou Camp and being proud of my part in a great team win but football then wasn't what it is now. Even the Nou Camp wasn't the massive arena people now know it as. I think there has been another two tiers added since we played there."

There certainly was a two-tier football hierarchy then as now - United the paupers to Barca's princes. Yet, still it defies belief that Tommy Millar's decision to travel to Spain resulted in the one part-timer in the club's 14-man squad being sacked by the printing firm that employed him. Compensation, albeit meagre, would have come in the form of the healthy win bonus earned by the United players. "All we were worrying about on the way to Barcelona were our bonuses," Hainey jokes. "United always did well by us and I remember we really did all right out of that tie."

Perhaps the club felt they could set financial incentives at generous levels because they would never have to make good on them. When the draw was made, only 17 days after Barca had lifted the Fairs Cup for a third time, the Dundee Courier laid bare the little expectations over the tie Jerry Kerr's team arrived at through receiving a bye in the first round.

"Let's be honest - the shock will reverberate through Europe if United pull this off," said the paper. Feasting on the glory that ensued in the Nou Camp, Courier reporter Tommy Gallacher was moved to declare the first-leg success "a triumph of teamwork and tactics for a team whose defence was magnificent from first to last".

It was a triumph that Hainey feared might exact too high a price. "Orjan Persson ran himself into the ground that night and he was absolutely exhausted at the end," he says. "He had to lie on the treatment table afterwards and could hardly breathe. For a while we were really worried, it was frightening."

Persson was involved in an altercation near the end of the first leg. The bad feeling spilled into the return as the frustration of the Barca players manifested itself in running battles. But that does not explain why Hainey did not snare himself one of the Catalan club's famous shirts at the conclusion of the tie.

"Their players were not happy, not happy at all because they thought nothing else but that they would overturn our 2-0 win," says Hainey. "It all got a bit messy but there was no way we would have considered swapping tops. United would have gone aff their heids if we had given away our jerseys."

Reward for eliminating the holders was of the dubious variety, with Juventus drawn in the next round. "We could hardly believe that we got yet another of the really big clubs," Hainey says. "But we gave a good account of ourselves and should never have lost 3-0 in the first leg in Italy. That flattered them but it left us no way back, though we were good for our 1-0 win."

Back-to-back home wins over Barcelona and Juventus is what you call a European adventure, no matter how brief.

July242007

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