Inverness Caley Thistle manager Billy Dodds says "I hope the injury crisis is not in the players' minds"after heaviest league defeat of the season at Greenock Morton
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HEAD coach Billy Dodds hopes the injury crisis is not playing into the minds of his players as Inverness Caledonian Thistle suffered their worst league defeat of the season at Greenock Morton.
Inverness were missing eight players due to injuries last night, but Dodds refused to use the amount of players out as the reason for defeat.
He says that he hopes the number of players absent in the squad is not impacting the way they are playing.
He said: "I hope the injury crisis is not in the players' minds. I said before the game I don't want to make injuries an excuse.
"You can see we're not a bad team. We pass the ball and keep it. Our movement was good on Friday.
"Our confidence will be knocked a bit - that's what happens.
"However, Partick Thistle beat us 4-1 earlier in the season. It was 4-0 until the dying seconds when we scored a consolation goal, so we will regroup again - we're capable of that.
"After Morton beat us 1-0 in August, we regrouped and went on a good run, so we are capable but we need to be better at both ends of the park.
"We've been solid defensively overall this season and been good at taking the odd chance that comes our way. We can certainly improve as that wasn't good enough at Morton."
Dodds says his players were taught a lesson in ruthlessness against Morton at Cappielow.
He says his team have to start taking the chances in front of goal when presented with them.
"We didn't defend well and finish well. If you put that into the game, you're not going to win it.
"We passed the ball well on occasions and we had periods of play, which seems crazy when we lost 4-0.
"Ultimately, when you defend like that and let runners go and there were so many of them, that's what happens.
"We lost the goals and then it becomes a mountain to climb, because the players are demoralised and down. We stuck at it and we lost another crazy goal, then another one.
"We stuck at it again in the second half. We were unlucky with the fourth goal. We had a couple of tackles and there was good passing from Cameron Blues and they scored.
"Morton were ruthless. As much as my defenders didn't produce, and didn't defend key areas at vital times, I don't think the forwards, wide players or even midfielders getting in the box were ruthless enough.
"I'd like someone to get hurt by throwing themselves at it."
