Dundee and new manager Mark McGhee brush off six-match touchline ban

Dundee and Mark McGhee brushed off the impact of his outstanding six-match touchline ban after the former Motherwell and Aberdeen boss was handed an unexpected return to front-line management.

McGhee was appointed within 24 hours of James McPake being sacked and admitted his close friendship with Gordon Strachan, Dundee’s technical director, had helped him.

The 64-year-old, who was Strachan’s Scotland assistant, received a six-match ban from the Scottish Football Association shortly after being sacked by Motherwell in the wake of a 5-1 home defeat by Dundee in February 2017.

The ban, for a misconduct charge relating to his touchline behaviour during a 7-2 defeat by Aberdeen, was not carried over into his subsequent managerial job at Barnet.

Dundee have 13 games left to avoid relegation – they sit second-bottom in the cinch Premiership, one ahead of St Johnstone and six adrift of guaranteed safety.

But McGhee dismissed concerns that sitting in the stand for about half of those remaining matches would be a hindrance.

“It won’t be any problem, it really won’t, and I don’t say that lightly,” he said.

“We have a guy on the bench, Simon Rusk, with Dave Mackay, who are well capable of marshalling the troops from the side.

“We have communication methods these days, mic’d up and phones of course, that I can be in touch with the bench.

“The way the ban works, I have got to be out of the dressing room for 75 minutes before the game. Normally I address the players 90 minutes before a game.

“At half-time I am able to meet somewhere in the building with Simon and Dave and discuss what we have seen.

“We have no issues about it. The issue was more about perception, how guys like yourselves would view it.

“It was definitely a difficulty