Observers over the last days could be forgiven for thinking that Chris Cadden would be a man, or should that be a teenager, on a mission against Dundee yesterday.
To those unfamiliar with the Motherwell midfielder, newspaper headlines, sound bites from his manager and hundreds of tweets will have brought it to their attention that he is a player who surely has a bright future in the game. The reason for this outcry was of course sparked by Cadden’s omission from the Scotland under-21 squad for the forthcoming Euro qualifying double header. Such was the outpouring of astonishment you’d never have known that the Motherwell academy graduate has never in fact been recognised by his country at any level, or the fact that this is his first proper season as a senior player. Regardless of that, there will have been few within Fir Park yesterday left with any doubt by the time this 0-0 stalemate with Dundee was brought to a close left wondering what all the fuss was about.
Rightly voted the sponsors man of the match, Cadden was a driving force for the home side throughout this match, particularly in the first half as the hosts dominated. A tireless performance both on the right and through the middle was no flash in the pan. Indeed it has been typical of the local lad’s attitude ever seen he was first blooded into the team properly last year.
As he descended into the media room afterwards to speak about the most mental and perhaps disappointing weeks of his life, the glint was evident in his eye as talk of a late call-up began to circulate.
“I have not heard anything about it,” said the kid of the hour. “If I do get called up that would be brilliant for me and my family.
“It was a surprise when the whole thing blew up last week, Twitter went mental and I don’t think I’ve had so many notifications. All I can do is keep playing well for Motherwell, that’s the most important thing, and hopefully Scotland call ups will come.
“It was good to hear the gaffer show confidence in me, you’d rather he was backing you for one than say I should be getting one.
“I just have to keep my head down, keep playing well for this club and see what happens.”
Cadden is a player who has not just established himself as part of this Motherwell team but enhanced it. Yesterday his bursting runs down the right caused chaos in the Dundee defence, so much so that his rival for the day Kevin Holt even questioned how he didn’t get into the squad.
As for the rest of the Motherwell team, it was all puff and no blow as swathes of possession and flashes of intricate one-twos rarely caused Dundee goalkeeper Scott Bain any concern. Only a parried Scott McDonald shot from the edge of the area and solid stop from a similar area to deny Lionel Ainsworth gave him much to do.
As for Paul Hartley’s side, a woeful showing in the first half was rectified by a lot more urgency after the break, including an early flurry that had their hosts camped in for the first 10 minutes. The real damage incurred by the loss of Greg Stewart and Kane Hemmings still has to be found out, but replacement Faissal El Bakhtaoui showed brief glimpses with a few cute touches and a couple of shots late on.
“Overall the team were great because it's not an easy place to come,” said the Dundee manager. “A point and a clean sheet away from home, we have to build on that. I thought we did enough to win it, especially the second half. We were on the front foot and had some really good situations where we should have done better in the final third.”
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