RAY McKINNON puffs out his cheeks, exhales deeply and offers a wry smile. It has been pointed out to the Dundee United manager that 30 years have now passed since the club was beating Barcelona on their way to the UEFA Cup final. Try follow that one.

The ambitions are rather more modest nowadays. His priority remains trying to take United back into the top flight at the first attempt but tomorrow he will also attempt to put silverware back into the Tannadice trophy cabinet when his team take on St Mirren with the Irn-Bru Cup at stake. Having been part of the United side that lost to Stenhousemuir in the final of this competition back in 1995, McKinnon certainly isn’t going to start being sniffy about it.

"Dave Bowman never stops talking about Barcelona,” he laughs. “Every single day. Those were great days but it wouldn't take a miracle - it would take 10 miracles for something like that to ever happen again. But we want to win the cup because that would be great for the fans. They were all hurting after relegation and if we could get them a piece of silverware that would keep them tiding over and give them something to cheer and something to look forward to. If we can get a good performance and a positive result then we can take that into the rest of the season and, hopefully, all the way into the play-offs.”

This is the cup that no Championship side ever wants to retain. Just like Rangers last year, the ideal scenario would be for United to lift the trophy and then win promotion.

“It would be perfect if we won it and couldn’t defend it but Jack Ross has done well at St Mirren,” added McKinnon. “Since the turn of the year he’s brought in nine players and they gave us a tough game last week so I’m expecting something similar this weekend. But we have quality in our ranks. It’s obviously a cup we want to win and it would be nice to do that at the first attempt because it took Rangers four goes before they did it.

“It’s been a new experience, with Welsh and Irish clubs taking part in it, so it’s a prestigious trophy as far as I’m concerned.”

Promotion, though, remains the primary goal this season. “We would love to go up. Look at Hibs, they have been down for three season and Rangers were two years here. It's difficult and you do have to restructure and rebuild but we would like to go up. It would hurt us financially if we don't go up. But we are building a squad here. There are a lot of players out of contract and there are a lot who probably won't get new contracts because they are the wrong age and the squad was put together quickly. There is another rebuild on and another season in the Championship may be beneficial in some respects but ultimately we want to be in the Premiership, no doubt about it.”

There is frustration from some United supporters at being asked to travel to Fir Park in Motherwell for a lunchtime kick-off and McKinnon can understand why.

"It's disappointing, the 12.30pm kick off and the location of it is difficult. It would have been nice if it had been more central, like Dunfermline or somewhere, but we will just get on with it.”