MORTON’S Joe McKee refuses to read into pre-season results after last year — but believes it was Saturday’s performance against Premiership St Mirren that offered encouragement for the season ahead.

The 21-year-old midfielder has sampled success in the Renfrewshire Cup final, having played 86 minutes of the Ton’s 4-2 triumph at St Mirren Park 12 months ago.

It proved something of a false dawn, however, as Allan Moore’s side went on to lose 1-0 at Annan in the Challenge Cup the following week, heralding a horrible season which saw them relegated.

But looking ahead to the upcoming campaign, McKee is confident that, despite the 1-0 defeat to the Saints, the display still gave an indication that the current squad can achieve success in League One.

He told the Tele: “It’s disappointing losing, especially the way we did with a goal with about 10 minutes to go.

“There were a few heads down in the changing room after the game, but I said to the boys to try and not to get too down about it.

“The most important thing is the season and I thought the performance was encouraging.

“The boys are all clued in; they’re fit; they’re raring to go. Everybody’s working hard and working together.

“And I think the fans will know themselves that if we play like that next week when the games start to really, really mean something then we’ll do all right.

“Last season we thought we had a decent pre-season and then we went and got beat off Annan, so we’re going to make sure that doesn’t happen again.

“If we work as hard as we did during pre-season and against St Mirren at the weekend then games should take care of themselves.” McKee, who featured on the right of midfield for much of the derby, was presented with a great chance to give his side the lead just after the hour.

The Ton man felt sure he had scored as soon as he had connected with the ball, but his crisp left-footed strike was expertly saved by Saints keeper Marian Kello.

Reflecting afterwards, he felt that he may well have put too much power behind the finish rather than placing it but also praised Slovak shot-stopper Kello.

He added: “Obviously it was a good performance last year when we won 4-2, but things sort of fell for us in that game.

“At one of the goals, the ball hit off Obri [David O’Brien] and went in the bottom corner, and we were looking for that luck on Saturday.

“But the goalie’s pulled off a couple of very good saves. I mean the chance I had, I thought it was in as soon as I hit it, because I’ve hit it that cleanly.

“I think I’ve maybe hit it too clean. If I sclaff it, it maybe goes in.

“But the goalie’s pulled off a great save. There’s nothing you can do but give him some credit.”