MORTON captain Jim McAlister says he’s triggered another one-year deal at the Ton — but that any immediate talk of his future is on hold at the moment.

The midfielder revealed he’s activated a clause in his contract after making 25 appearances this season, which entitles him to a new deal for next season.

If the skipper was to extend his stay with the Greenock club, he would enter his ninth season at Cappielow and would be one year away from a testimonial season.

The Tele understands he is one of a number of players to have such a contract clause, with other squad members also nearing that appearance threshold.

Morton currently have no first team players signed up for next season, with manager Jonatan Johansson and his assistant Peter Houston having their deals run until the end of next term.

But with plenty more games to go this season, the 33-year-old says talk of extending his stay at Cappielow is not his main focus right now.

He told the Tele: “I’ve played the games to activate another one-year-deal at the club, we’ll see how that goes long term.

“I’m just looking to play out the season and there are more important things to be worrying about at the club, that’s for sure.

“The club will probably be looking at getting players on pre-contracts for next season, and start to build their squad and they’ve not got any players under contract, which isn’t good going forward for something to build on.

“It’s not in the forefront of my mind.

“I’ll be entitled to another year’s contract which will be good for my security going forward and we just need to see what the club come up with.”

The Ton have had mixed results in recent weeks, with the manager and players coming under pressure after losses to Alloa and East Fife.

McAlister says he doesn’t know why the performance levels are so up and down this season.

He added: “It could be the mentality, you will have to ask the others but we’ve had discussions about it. 

“You should have an inner determination to win everything you do, whether that’s at training or wherever.

“The senior boys in the squad have had that conversation with the squad, the management as well.

“You should hate losing if it’s a possession game at training, in games, a shooting exercise, you should want to win regardless.

“If you’re a winner every day at training you’ll automatically take that into matches on Saturday.

“If you could ask me to put my finger on why it keeps happening I probably couldn’t.”