He's a brilliant boy – Derek McInnes hails Hearts match-winner Stuart Findlay
However, Findlay popped up with an equaliser and then headed home a dramatic last-gasp winner.
The towering defender already has four goals to his name this season, with manager McInnes admitting that is a far cry from
when he was playing under him on loan at Kilmarnock.
McInnes said: 'I couldn't get him to score a goal at Kilmarnock, but I cannot stop him now! Stuart's a brilliant human, he's a brilliant boy.
'First and foremost he's got to do his job well defensively as they all do at the back and I think he does that week in, week out.
'It's actually nice to see him getting a wee bit of a chance to shine and getting a wee bit of applause from that side of it.
'You see the supporters are choking for heroes.
'Stuart's job is to try and stop the other team's better players and he does that time and time again, but it's great for him to score goals.'
United boss Jim Goodwin admitted his side's efforts in securing a 2-2 draw away to Rapid Vienna in the Conference League last week, allied to a lengthy injury list, took their toll on his players.
He said: 'The second half we didn't offer a great deal going forward. Hearts dominated the ball, but given the situation we're in with seven big players out this afternoon, we've got very little in the way of being able to rotate the squad and freshen things up.'
Goodwin, though, is confident his players can bounce back for the second leg at home to Rapid on Thursday night.
He added: 'Yes, I think we can. Tannadice is going to be rocking. It'll be a full house, I would imagine.
'The adrenaline, I think, will do enough to get them through the 90 minutes and hopefully do enough to get us into that play-off position.'
Goodwin is in the last 10 months of his contract at United, but the Irishman insists he is close to extending his deal.
He added: 'I'm in the final year of my contract and conversations are happening at the moment with the chairman and the CEO. Hopefully, that's something we can resolve quickly in the coming days.'
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