MORTON aim to get back on track tomorrow as they take to the road following their home defeat last Saturday against Ayr United.

Ton will face off against Queen's Park at their rented Ochilview home, intent on securing a positive result as an interesting first quarter of the campaign begins to edge towards its close.

Up until last weekend things had largely been going well for the Greenock men, but the reverse against the Honest Men was a disappointment given the strong emphasis manager Dougie Imrie has placed on turning Cappielow into 'a fortress'.

To lose the unbeaten home record at just the third hurdle will not have been what he had in mind, even if it was against the league leaders who have made such an impressive start.

Morton will likely consider that lost ground and will be looking to recover it immediately ahead of the matches against Arbroath and Partick Thistle which will conclude the first round of Championship fixtures.

In the final analysis of last Saturday's match there was no huge gulf between the two sides, as the 2-1 scoreline would tend to suggest.

If anything it provided further proof that there is little to choose between most teams in the division on any given day, but at the same time it reinforced the areas where Morton are lacking and need to improve.

If they had been more focused and decisive defensively at the clutch moments they could have recorded a clean sheet, but a succession of individual errors instead left them two goals down and facing an uphill struggle.

This was a repeat of their away loss to Raith Rovers, showing that lessons have not been learned.

For the first goal, Ton failed to first clear their lines properly and then allowed Dipo Akinyemi space on the edge of the box to shift the ball on to his left foot and fire a precision strike past Brian Schwake.

It was all the more galling that it came marginally against the run of play, and for the fact that they had been well warned about the striker's threat beforehand.

Ayr's second and match-winning strike, netted by Mark McKenzie, came about much too easily as well and left the hosts with a mountain to climb.

Yet of equal concern for Morton was the fact that their lack of cutting edge was exposed again and with just five goals netted in six matches - two of them penalties - only the rock bottom Red Lichties are doing worse than them in the goalscoring stakes.

If there was a crumb of comfort to take then it was the fact that Robbie Muirhead at least managed to get off the mark and the manager will be looking to him to add a few more now.

Muirhead's maiden strike of the campaign only proved to be a consolation but hopefully now he is up and running it will give him a lift and spur him on to get his name on the scoresheet more regularly.

Ton have been operating with an attacking trident up until now but after the six games that have been and gone they may need to freshen things up either in terms of personnel or shape.

Utilising all three of Muirhead, Jai Quitongo and Jaze Kabia together from the start in matches has not paid dividends as yet in terms of a return at the top end of the pitch, but it has also left the manager with a lack of options to turn to when he needs to make substitutions.

Changes were arguably made too late on Saturday, and when they were it was telling that Ton suddenly looked more of a threat when sub Alan Lithgow was launched up front late on.

He at least provided a makeshift focal point and gave them an aerial physical presence which had Ayr wobbling a little for a minute or two as Morton looked to salvage something.

If Lithgow is to return to the side then obviously it would be at the back, either at the expense of one of the two central defenders or coming in as a third with a shift in formation away from a flat four.

The latter option would of course also permit the return of Lewis Strapp as a wing back after a spell on the bench, while still leaving space in the midfield for Alexander King who has made a good start to the season and would enable a shake-up in attack.

It will be interesting to see what changes the manager will make, as he sets his side up for the challenge brought by Owen Coyle's Spiders.

Most eyes were trained on League 1 champions Cove Rangers when they came up, but so far it's been the Glasgow club who have settled the better of the two newcomers.

They have posted some excellent results and currently sit two points ahead of Morton, but also go into the game off the back of a defeat.

Having gone down 3-0 at Dundee last weekend they will want to bounce back immediately as well, setting up the prospect of an open 90 minutes with two sides going out looking to win the game.