MORTON defender Morgan Boyes says it's imperative his new side get off to a winning start to their League Cup group stage against East Fife.

The former Livi and Inverness defender says getting off to a strong start is crucial to building up some early momentum ahead of what promises to be gruelling league campaign.

And despite his disappointment at losing out to St Mirren in Tuesday night’s friendly - Boyes says he and his teammates must take the positives from each half to put in a full performance against East Fife tomorrow.

He told the Tele: “You always want to get off to a strong start, you want to try and get some momentum built as early as possible, in the hope that snowball effects into the league campaign.

“You’re never happy to lose a game. But you need to try and take the positives from the game when they present themselves.

“I think what we showed in the first half, bar the goals, was really, really good.

“The second half did fall off a bit, but that usually happens in pre-season games.

"So hopefully we can follow up with performances like we put in during the first half, for the rest of the season.

“I think if we can take our on-the-ball performance from the first half and combine it with our second half performance off the ball, to then take that into tomorrow, then I’ve no doubts that we can go on and do well.”

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MORTON boss Dougie Imrie has made it through pre-season with fairly little damage inflicted on his new squad as they look to assault the Premier Sports Cup group stages.

The Ton gaffer could be made to wait to give Nathan Shaw his competitive bow as he works his way back from a delayed operation on a hamstring injury sustained at the end of last season.

Dylan Corr too must wait for a run out, after suffering a repeat of the shoulder injury sustained at Raith last season that has seen him miss a few weeks of action.

Other than that it's a clean bill of health for Imrie who's pre-season couldn't have gone much better.

This time last season Ton had just faced off against St Mirren with a bench full of trialists including TikTok star Brandon Diau, who's chance to impress the Ton gaffer had been disrupted by a horror-injury sustained by fellow trainee Michael Doyle, who'd dislocated his kneecap.

Thankfully, nothing like that has happened this time around ahead of tomorrow's opener against East Fife as the Ton chief looks to build up steam ahead of their league opener against Partick next month.