THEY say that league titles aren’t won in August. What is less acknowledged is that you can still go a long way towards losing them in those first four weeks.

In the last decade, the champions of Scotland’s third tier have on average lost just 4.8 of their total fixtures. Statistically speaking, a poor start can effectively end a promotion charge before it’s begun.

So, it might only have been the second game of the League One campaign, but Saturday’s emphatic 4-0 victory over nine-man Stranraer could prove to be a defining moment in Morton’s season.

After suffering an opening-day defeat at Ayr United and with just one of their first four league fixtures to be played at Cappielow, it was hugely important that the Ton took all three points.

A failure to do so would have left Jim Duffy’s men facing gruelling back-to-back treks to Peterhead and Forfar Athletic plagued with doubts and under significant external pressure.

They could have quite conceivably found themselves off the title pace with just one month of the season elapsed.

Therefore, to record a resounding four-goal win against the team that finished third in League One last term will boost confidence both on the pitch and the terraces ahead of those testing away trips.

It also sets down a marker in front of the home support and lets their third-tier rivals know that Morton mean business at Cappielow.

The fact that the result was achieved against a team who played 59 minutes with 10 men and 14 minutes with nine should, on the other hand, serve to temper expectations.

However, it should also be remembered that despite a cautious opening quarter of an hour, Declan McManus was about to score before his feet were whipped out from under him by David Mitchell.

It was on 17 minutes that inventive winger Jamie McCluskey jinked inside a challenge with a Cristiano Ronaldo style heel-chop and slipped the Aberdeen striker on in goal.

McManus scurried clear down the inside right channel, skipped around Mitchell with consummate ease and was about to roll into an unguarded net when he was tripped by the Stranraer keeper.

Referee Greg Aitken had no option but to show him the red card for denying a clear goal scoring opportunity.

Custodian Chris Fahey’s first task after replacing midfielder Sean Winter was to pick the ball out of the net.

McManus seemed to have ice in his veins as he stepped up and rolled the ball into the bottom-left corner while Fahey went the opposite way.

For the opening 13 minutes or so, Stranraer had been in charge, with the one-man advantange in the middle of the park created by their 3-1-4-2 formation making a noticeable difference.

But after things were levelled up in the midfield due to the red card, the formation — and the back three in particular — became the root of their problems.

The Ton midfield had more space to operate and jet-heeled McManus’s terrific movement saw him exploit the spaces between their three centre-halves and behind their wing-backs.

Thomas O’Ware — reinstalled as a striker as part of a twin pairing with McManus — meanwhile, was posing their back-line a different type of threat.

On 22 minutes, he barged ahead of his marker to get on the end of a cross that Ricki Lamie had bent in from the left but stubbed the ball into the ground and straight at Fahey from barely four yards.

If that miss had betrayed his lack of a true striker’s instinct, his expertly executed swivelled snapshot from the edge of the box that fizzed just wide could’ve convinced you he had been a No 9 all his days.

After playing up top on his own at Somerset Park, McManus was in his element working off the makeshift targetman.

And only a smart save from Fahey prevented him from adding a second goal with an angled drive after his strike partner had put him in behind with a measured through ball.

Mark Russell, in from the start with Jordan Allan suspended, forced former Albion Rovers keeper Fahey into another fine save on 27 minutes.

The teenager took a short corner, received a return from McCluskey and drifted past Jamie Longworth in his own inimitably fluid way before whipping a wicked curling effort toward goal.

The finish was too central, though, and Fahey stretched to flip the ball over the crossbar and deny Russell his first senior goal.

Morton were stretching Stranraer to breaking point, running them ragged from the moment they were reduced to 10 men.

Nine minutes had passed before Blues boss Stevie Aitken scrapped his three-man defence and moved to a 4-4-1 formation. The only surprise was that he hadn’t made the tactical switch sooner.

Although it was a change that stemmed Morton’s relentless attacking flow to an extent, two pieces of individual brilliance saw the hosts put the game to bed before half-time.

When Stefan Milojevic found McCluskey stationed out on the right flank with a raking diagonal pass just after the half hour, there seemed little danger.

But the former Hibs wideman’s sublime first touch took him inside Barry Russell while simultaneously opening up the space for him to advance unopposed into the opposition box.

Without slowing and before anyone could get across to get a block in, he lashed a laser-beam guided strike past Fahey and inside the left-hand post to score a glorious first goal in Ton colours.

Alongside McCluskey, McManus was Morton’s other chief protagonist, and like his team-mate, the Aberdeen kid produced a moment of magic to conjure up a goal out of thin air.

Collecting the ball down by the corner flag after Lee Kilday’s throw was flicked backwards by Russell under pressure from O’Ware, the striker seemed to have nowhere to go.

In everyone else’s mind, that is.

He proceeded to knock the ball inside Frank McKeown while darting round the other side before collecting at the other end just ahead of Craig Pettigrew.

Combining impressive strength with ingenuity, he held off the Stranraer No 4 and then squeezed the ball between Fahey and his near post to completely catch the keeper by surprise.

Prior to Saturday’s game, McManus told the Tele he has set himself a target of scoring 10 goals in his time with the Ton.

But he was denied the opportunity to take himself closer to that tally with a hat-trick on his home debut when whistler Aitken refused to award what seemed a stonewall penalty on 54 minutes.

After breaking clear of Pettigrew, O’Ware was tugged back by the Stranraer defender and stumbled while trying to get his shot away.

Aitken seemed to acknowledge the foul but suggested that he had allowed play to go on with O’Ware clear on goal.

However, the foul left O’Ware off balance as he prodded towards goal, meaning that there was no real advantage to be found in allowing the action to progress.

It was a call that would have caused uproar should the match have been tight, but it was quickly forgotten when Ton stretched their lead two minutes later.

When a Russell corner from the left was half cleared and the retrieving Lamie headed down to Pepper 25 yards from goal, the diminutive Irishman made a snap decision to go for goal.

It proved to be an inspired call as his sweetly struck half volley screamed into the net past Fahey’s despairing full-length dive to his right.

While Ton’s attacking players were given ample opportunity to showcase their talents, goalkeeper Derek Gaston was a virtual spectator at the other end.

Ironically, his only meaningful save of the entire contest was rendered irrelevant when Scott Robertson, whose dipping volley he spectacularly flipped wide, was flagged offside.

The action was all occurring at the other end, and how the hosts failed to extend their lead will remain a mystery, especially following a second Stranraer red card on 76 minutes.

Left-back Russell was the culprit and could have no complaints when he was shown his second yellow card of the afternoon for a pull on sub Reece Hands.

McManus fired the resultant free-kick narrowly wide and also passed up a couple of other inviting openings as Ton piled on the pressure.

Their four-goal and two-man advantage made it the ideal, pressure-free environment to hand a debut to development squad striker Thomas Orr.

The 17-year-old exhibited the predatory penalty box instincts that saw him claim 40 goals for Derek Allan’s Under-17s last term twice in his first five minutes on the pitch.

Unfortunately for Orr, there would be no fairy tale beginning to his professional career as he saw a tap-in ruled out for offside before failing to make a proper connection with Pepper’s deep cross.

An Orr goal, or a McManus hat-trick for that matter, would have simply been the cherry on the icing on the cake.

In terms of the bigger picture, Morton had long since secured the three points urgently required to get their season off and running.