FUMING Jim Duffy let his Morton flops have both barrels for a pitiful second-half performance in Saturday’s 1-0 home loss to Peterhead.

The Ton conceded an awful goal 12 seconds after the restart and failed to muster any sort of spirited response in the remaining 44 minutes.

Duffy criticised his side for a lack of desire and determination to turn it around on the day and admitted it left him irate at full-time.

He said: “That’s the angriest I’ve been this season. I think you can accept certain situations, certain performances, and mistakes or human error.

“But I was angry with how they responded — or how they DIDN’T respond. We didn’t show enough composure allied to real desire or determination to turn it around.

“We had 45 minutes to do it. It’s not as if they scored in the last minute.

“They scored in first seconds of the half, but we got little response, if any.

“What angered me was that too many shied away from responsibility, and when you do that you have very little chance of taking anything from the game. It was a shocking goal to lose. It was caused by failing to do the basics. A long ball, a flick-on and a gamble - it was really, really poor defending.

“It’s bitterly disappointing to concede so soon after half-time. You almost have to start screaming and shouting at them to make sure they go out alert for the second half.

“You start banging tactics boards and having half-time tantrums to see whether you can get them up to speed for the second half.

“We played pretty well defensively in the first half but the goal is just a long ball. That’s about concentration; it should be tidied up every day of the week.

“That’s players just going out and for whatever reason not being up to speed when the game starts. It’s a soft, soft goal to lose and easily defendable as far as I’m concerned.

“[The way we played] after that disappointed me as well. We looked a bag of nerves at times, but there were still 45 minutes to go.

“The opposition take confidence from it and everything becomes too erratic from us.The amount of times we gave the ball away under no real pressure was evidence of the players being uptight.

“There was no composure, and ultimately I can’t really remember us threatening Graeme Smith too often in the second half. There were one or two efforts but nothing of any real note.

“We huffed and puffed but there was nothing about us really. It looked as though somebody had taken the batteries out of the guys in the second half. There wasn’t a spark at all. We can have no complaints about the second half. Our performance wasn’t good enough in the second half, there’s no question about that. We were miles off it.

“In the first half we created three brilliant chances but didn’t score any of them and that was pivotal in how the game turned out.

“If you score it relaxes everybody: it relaxes the players, it relaxes the fans, and you don’t need to rush the game or hurry things. You can take your time a little bit.

“That’s been symptomatic of our season. There’s not been too many times we’ve played well for 90 minutes and that’s something that’s blighted our season.”