JIM Duffy says he had to do a double-take after witnessing Ricki Lamie net the equaliser against St Mirren on Saturday — because he couldn’t believe it was the defender who had scored.

Lamie bagged his first goal in Morton colours against the Buddies at the weekend in the third minute of stoppage time. And his manager was delighted with the 23-year-old for notching his maiden goal for the Ton.

Duffy said: “I think it was the only goal he’s ever scored for us. When I saw him celebrating I had to rub my eyes and take-two.

“Anyone who knows me knows I don’t drink too much, but I felt that someone had maybe spiked my water, because I thought ‘it can’t be Ricki’. But fair play to him, we were a bit unlucky with one or two set pieces and we got our reward with our last one.”

Duffy was thrilled with his team’s response after going a goal, and a man, down following Gary Mackenzie’s opener and Jamie McDonagh’s red card.

And despite feeling like his own side should have had a penalty on half-time, he was content with the way his side knuckled down under adversity and kept going until the end.

He said: “It was a bit more than perseverance, it was the way we played. We didn’t feel sorry for ourselves when things were going against us.

“We thought we should’ve had a penalty right on half-time when Gary was kicked on the face and had to come off at half-time with a sore one. He was disorientated, his mouth and nose all burst.

“He was kicked on the face when he was going to head the ball into the goal, so for me, that was an obvious penalty. We had to change things around when Jamie was sent-off. I have no qualms about that, it was a straight red card. The referee was 100 per cent right.

“But I felt we just needed to calm down after that, and I felt that in the last 20 minutes we were the team that was looking to try and press the game and thankfully we got the rewards in the last minute.

“The players’ mentality and desire was there. Just before [the equaliser], Ross Forbes made a fantastic block on [Lewis] Morgan and Gavin Gunning had a great block. Those types of things gave us a chance to get an equaliser and that showed the desire from the players.”

Duffy’s tactical tinkering played its part, when he replaced holding midfielder Jamie Lindsay with attacker Aidan Nesbitt after 72 minutes.

Ton began knocking at St Mirren’s door with relentless attacks, and they eventually got their just rewards.

He concluded: “We looked at the clock and with 20/25 minutes to go, we needed two up top because with one up I felt St Mirren were controlling the game at the back and knocking it about their back four. 

“We had to put a bit of pressure on them up there so we went three at the back and put Nizzy up there with Kudus to put more pressure on them. It gave us a bit more threat in the forward area, even if it wasn’t an exact success.”